Ánthrōpos métron (To Be re-written)
by Tactful Grimalkin
Summary: Percy Jackson, born mortal, attempts to survive a chaotic world after Olympus falls to Kronos:"I'm not a demigod, or monster, or god, and I'm pretty sure I'm not even Greek. I'm just Percy Jackson, a kid trying his best to survive the end of the world. That plan never included snake women, oracles, gods, or daughters of gods, but I don't think it's going to work anymore, anyways."
1. Prologue

Naturally, the apocalypse started on my 16th birthday.

No one knew why it happened. I don't think anyone really stopped to think about it. It was like the system the world ran on just malfunctioned on a global scale. How a nuclear holocaust hadn't happened yet is just short of a miracle. I'm sure some now-dead hero deserves some thanks for that.

First came the storm systems. Ran all the way across the continental united states from Washington state to New York. It was like a hundred tornadoes tangled together, but somehow worse. I remember seeing something on the news about it leaving a crater almost a quarter-mile in diameter somewhere in rural Idaho, and I was not believing that news reporter who stammered something about it picking up a particularly large rock and then jettisoning it back at the ground.

When it finally got to New York, it was weird. I barely lasted more than five minutes before blowing out to sea almost too quickly for it to be real, leaving damage, broken windows, and the streets mildly flooded with sewer water. It felt like dodging a bullet, that is, if a bullet suddenly curving around you instead of continuing it's expect path fell under the broad definition of 'dodging'.

New York breathed a sigh of relief, and so did I. Looking back, I realized the only person who didn't seem relieved was, oddly, my mom, who looked, if anything, nervous. I wonder sometimes if she somehow knew.

Not three days later, the riots started.

It was weird. Sure, people were angry, there was shit in the street for god's sake, people kinda had a right to be annoyed, but things were escalating way too fast. What started as a bunch of people grumbling over coffee would quickly become a strike, which quickly became a full blown riot. Then all of the riots started joining forces, and the police were called in. The weird thing was, it wasn't even localized. News stations were reporting about riots from all over, even places where the storm system didn't wreck.

We stayed inside a lot during those early days, and I think it saved our ass. The store my mom worked at part time had been flooded by shit, and her college classes had been canceled. The high school I went to, where Paul, my stepfather, also happened to work, had taken damage in the storm, and classes were canceled until further notice. It was alright at first, but things got increasingly uneasy as time went by. It was three days before we got to see what a riot really looked like.

It was late at night, something like 10:30, when a riot passed by below our apartment, and let me tell you, it was a little terrifying looking down on that. People were starting fires and attacking each other, it didn't even really seem to matter who, though rioters and police fought the most. They didn't seem to have a message or a demand, like they were rioting just for the sake of it or something.

Watching it made me angry. I didn't really know why, but I felt like I needed to do something. It wasn't a new feeling for me, I had been ADHD all my life, but something about the energy that was boiling under my skin felt different. I distinctly remember feeling an almost overwhelming compulsion to punch Paul, which was incredibly alien to me, since Paul was the best thing to happen to my mom.

My mom was the one who figured it out. All three of us were peering out of a window when she suddenly blanched. Me and Paul shared a worried glance. She stammered out an explanation that made no sense, until eventually simply ordering us to pay close attention to a man who was approaching the crowd with disarming gestures. He fished someone out the crowd, and they spoke for a moment, others in the riots parting around them to continue moving forward, before the man suddenly stopped making disarming gestures. The person they were talking to started getting physical, and the man clocked them in the face, and the fell like a rock. The man ran up to catch up with the riot.

I remember saying 'What the fuck?', and didn't even get a peep of dissent from my mom about "language", which pretty much told me that my reaction was the only reaction.

Paul was sharp enough to point out that it looked like some police officers had started joining the riots. I said that it didn't look like just 'a few' to me.

We came to the conclusion that, whatever was going on, those riots were not normal. It was like the second you got involved in one, reason would begin to fail you or something. Stay too long, and you go insane. We didn't think we were the only ones who figured this out, since a lot of people stopped going out to see the riots. We tried to wait out the riots, hoping that this could somehow blow over and the mass hysteria could be avoided.

That plan lasted a week, and in spite of her being the one to catch the little detail that probably saved our lives back when that riot passed by, that didn't help her when everything started to really go downhill, and I found myself another one of many orphans.

Logically, I know that the reason she died was because she was trying to protect me, and Paul, in turn, was trying to protect us both, but it still confused me a little. I know it should have been me, and by all rights, I deserved it a lot more than she did. I guess my theory of the best people having the worst luck was true after all.

Since then, I think the only thing that managed to keep me going was the fact my mom chose to die for me. I really wanted to quit sometimes. The world was awful, especially with one less person like Sally Jackson in it. But my life was a gift, and I would never throw away the last gift my mom had given me. It was the most precious thing I owned, and I had backpack with a few functioning lighters in it.

I wouldn't die. Even if the whole world fell apart until I was left with nothing, I was never going to give up what second chance my mom had given to me.

It's honestly kind of funny how this all turned out in the end, because that's exactly what happened, just not in the way I would have expected.

* * *

_AN: Okay, so It's a bit on the skimpy side, but I felt like if I didn't post something soon I would probably going to chicken out. This will serve as the prologue to the story, but originally, this was a little introduction that was supposed to be in chapter 1! Chapter 1 proper is already finished(and way, way longer, with dialog. The works, honestly.), but I want to give myself a bit of a buffer zone so I can update with some regularity without needing to rush anything. So I guess this is more of a... teaser? Yeah, let's go with that. It's not terribly interesting at this stage, but I am going to be diving right into Greek shenanigans, so hopefully that will entice you to stay around._

_I hope you enjoyed what little I provided, and have a wonderful day!_


	2. The Cabin Where It All Started

It had been four months since the beginning of the end, and I could really feel winter now.

I had looted some winter gear not long after my mom died, and it had managed to stave off hypothermia for the time being, but I knew it was going to do little against the winter of New York. I needed to start heading south, and soon, if I had any attachment to my toes.

I really shouldn't have stayed to November.

But, even with New York in ruins, and crumbling more and more every day as more and more people died, and the already rare sightings of people grew scarcer and scarcer, I couldn't help but feel attached to the broken city. It was like a old dog that needed to be put down, and I was seriously dragging my feet on _that_ walk to the woods.

I found myself standing in front of two piles of stones in central park. One was a little larger than the other, but both looked kinda dilapidated. The larger one had a stone, all smooth and ovular, and painted blue. I spent a few minutes tidying up the piles.

If 15 year old me could see me now, he'd surely not want to walk on the side of the street I was on. With my scraggly little beard and wispy mustache that I tried in vain to keep in check, disastrous hair from trying to cut it myself with safety scissors a month or so back, and that telltale layer of dirt that screamed homeless. The fact that I was arranging a pile of rocks like a madman wouldn't help either.

The whole process took longer than it should have, but, I felt like I needed to do a good job. It could have been my last time doing it. I placed the blue stone atop the larger pile, stood up, and stared at my humble grave markers.

"Mom." I croaked to the grave with the blue rock. I kept my voice low, so I wouldn't alert any other lingerers who might be stalking around the city. "I'm going now. "

"Gonna head south, for the winter, at least. I don't know if- When, I'll be back. I'll be safe. Don't worry." I swallowed thickly. This was incredibly _stupid_ and _sappy_, I know, but somehow it comforted me a little. "So, bye."

I turned away from the graves, and started walking, fighting against the compulsion to look back. The sooner I left the city, the better. I'd start dragging my feet all over again if I stuck around. But, before I really started heading south, I needed to make one final stop: Montauk.

Montauk had always been special to my mom, which meant it was just as special to me. She met my dad there, where they shared a whirlwind romance that lasted from the summer into the new year, and some months later, I had been born. Apparently, he had left my mom before she was aware that she was pregnant. She would always say he had always planned to return, but for whatever reason, he never did. Even so, she never said one bad word about the guy.

Please let the record show that I am not my Mom.

The walk was slow, and I was cold in spite of my jacket. The closer I got to Montauk, the more I doubted that I could handle being there, but I didn't stop. I needed to see that beach one last time.

Long island looked miserable. I didn't pass by a single store that didn't have shattered glass lying all around it. Cars were abandoned on streets, and there was dried blood splatter pretty much everywhere you looked. I did try to scope out the area to see if anything was worth looting, but almost everything had been stripped clean, probably from other people who were headed south.

I didn't see another person until I was more than halfway across long island, and the first thing I did when I heard footsteps was duck into a nearby alley. I held my breath as I heard the footsteps growing closer, and anguished panting rasped out into the air. I retreated further back into the alley, keeping close track of the street I had been walking on just moments before.

A man ran by the alley, and another soon followed, both paying me no notice.

My hands curled into fists and my feet itched to run after them. From what little I had caught of the first guy, he didn't look so good. I've seen people get hunted down and slaughtered for no good reason, especially early on when the city was still populated. I could never do anything about it though, too risky, but I couldn't help but feel like I should be able to do something.

I bit the interior of my cheek, and walked deeper into the alley, trying to forget the panicked man being chased. I couldn't risk trying to help some guy who could easily fuck me over for my trouble, I told myself. The logic appealed to me, so I did my best to forget having seen anything at all.

I kept walking, my backpack weighing heavier on my back than it did a minute ago.

* * *

The sun was going to start to set pretty soon. Thankfully, the full moon was coming either tomorrow or the next day, so there would be plenty of light to walk by. But, it still gets cold so fast when it's dark, I was going to have to find shelter somewhere nearby the beach. There were some caves around Montauk, if you knew where to look for them, so I wasn't too concerned.

I used to love when my mom drove me to Montauk, even the ride over was fun, because we would drive through the Hamptons. I remember how beautiful everything was; glamorous summer homes of the rich and famous, fully loaded mansions, pristine lawns kept in order even during the off season so the homeowners could always walk into a beautiful beach house that looked like it belonged in a modern fairy tale.

It was a place of things I'd never experienced, and probably never would, but sometimes, watching it go by in the car made Montauk feel more special.

I know, I know, _technically_, Montauk is a part of the Hamptons. But, I've never really considered it part of the Hamptons as much as the Hamptons bordered it. Montauk had a totally different atmosphere from the rest of the Hamptons, even with that surf lodge making it a little more crowded than I would like sometimes. But once you get deep into Montauk, and it gets all quiet and peaceful in the national parks and the beaches were devoid of the usual summer crowd, then you realize the difference. Montauk was definately not the Hamptons.

Back then, before the end of the world, the Hamptons felt like a pleasant welcome home, giving me little glimpses of things I might have been able to achieve, if I tried hard enough or got lucky enough, Before finally crossing the threshold to Montauk's inviting arms.

Now? Now, it felt like walking through the gates of hell.

As it turns out, when the world ended, and laws were forgotten overnight, 99% of the population had some economic bitterness issues they suddenly felt compelled to act upon. Being rich seemed to sour quickly when the world ends, and no hidden bank account on some island is going to help much against an angry mob.

What few houses weren't burnt down were trashed beyond recognition. Walls were torn down and ripped apart, glass still sprinkled the scruffy-looking lawns, expensive sports cars were flipped, crushed, and in once case, on the roof of a 3 story high mansion.

The place was even more abandoned than Manhattan. At least there I would occasionally see another survivor in the distance or someone trying to hide in the shadows. The Hamptons were just plain empty. I probably couldn't find another person wandering around if I wanted to. I knew there was no point in trying to loot anything, everyone in the Hamptons had either died or went south, and they took anything of value with them.

Not that I needed much at the moment. I had a small pocketknife, backpack filled with a combination of granola, lighters, two water bottles, and- get this- a box of gauze and a half-used bottle of _antiseptic_. Thanks to a miraculous night holding up in a drugstore I had assumed to have been stripped clean at first, I was richer than I'd ever been.

Relatively speaking, of course.

_'richer than ever and no one to share it with'_ A more well-loathed part of my mind reminded me, with a voice suspiciously similar to my old geometry teacher. I shook off the thought the best I could and kept walking, ignoring the roar of silence between my footsteps.

* * *

Before I knew it, I had found myself walking out of the prickly shrubs of Napeague State Park, and onto Montauk's beach.

The water looked freezing, and the beach was absolutely covered in seaweed and rocks that made it look pretty uninviting. Beach grass looked withered and lifeless, like it would crumble to the slightest touch. Litter was scattered here and there, and there was an almost uncanny amount of driftwood. I wondered if there was a shipwreck nearby or something.

The second my foot hit the sand, I knew I wasn't ready to come back.

The world turned upside down and I felt like I had been punched in the gut, driven a good fifty feet skywards and I was in the process of falling back down. My stomach churned to send it's last meal back, but I managed to gulp it down with what little focus I had left. I knew that returning to Montauk would hurt, but I never expected myself to react this way. I felt overwhelmed, and it was all I could do to duck my head low and keep walking, as I fought valiantly against the sting in my eyes.

My mom was dead, I knew that, I had grieved for it, I had cried about it, I had gotten angry about it, and I thought that it was something I had been able to move past, if only a bit. But, being back on Montauk made it feel raw, and fresh, like ripping off a scab when the original scrape hadn't had nearly enough time to heal.

But, at the same time, I knew it was a little like antiseptic. Hurts like hell to use it, but for your own good in the end. A part of me felt like I needed to do this, whether it be out of respect for my mom, or to just get it all out. I wasn't sure, but you'd bet your ass I listened to that over the parts of me that told me to turn tail and run.

I think my mom would be proud of me for doing it too, and that thought made it just a bit easier.

It was colder on the beach than it was behind the dunes, and the ocean wind cut through my jacket like it wasn't even there, but I found it hard to care. I _needed_ to do this. Plus, the beach was like a second home for me, and this one wasn't ruined by the end the world. It felt a little something like normal, for once.

As I walked along the beach, breathing came easier, which was weird, since I hadn't been having trouble breathing before I had gotten to the beach. It felt like I had only now grown accustomed to an extra weight in my chest that had been there for a long time, but hadn't fully realized it.

I raised my head, tried of staring at the blurry ground, and looked out to the ocean.

Holy shit, it looked cold. I Should have come before hypothermia was a guarantee from a little dip. I could use a swim.

Or water.

A shower, even.

I didn't have much of an idea of how bad I smelled, but the last time I saw running water, much less soap or deodorant, was months ago, and I might have hidden under a corpse somewhere between now and then. I'd rather not think about it.

Scrutinizing the water, I started to doubt that I would want to take a swim even if I had come in August. The sea looked oddly uninviting for a reason beyond just the threat of losing toes. Like every square inch of the water was a riptide waiting to drag me under and to my death. It was like staring out at a sheer cliff with no bottom instead of the ocean. It was a weird feeling.

I lost track of how much time I had been on the beach, but the sun was starting to set, the sky glowing gold on the horizon while the sky dimmed down for the night. I decided I was going to need to find a place to stay for the night, and fast.

Of course, when I actually did, I almost cried again.

I hadn't been walking for more than three more minutes when I stopped in my tracks and was struck by where I was. In the distance I could see a grey single story rental cabin. My breath hitched, and I broke out into a run a second before I consciously decided that I needed to go to that cabin.

The cabin my mom and I would stay at.

It almost seemed like it was impossible; those old shingles could pop off if you hit the house with a baseball too hard, how the hell was it supposed to stay standing after the fucking apocalypse? The floorboards would creak when you walked on them, the hinges on pretty much every door was loose and squeaky, and the windows shook in storm.

And yet, here it was, maybe a little worse for wear, and probably looted, but it was still _there_. A bubbling feeling rose up in my chest, like my lungs were filling with soda water and tickled the back of my throat.

The shades were drawn, but the windows were intact. A few shingles had fallen off, and littered the ground around the cottage, and sure, maybe it didn't look so great. But it was home. A little slice of my old life, from before all the chaos, and death. Before Gabe, before Paul, before everything, still standing. I'd never felt like hugging a building before, but if I said I wasn't tempted right then and there, I'd be a filthy liar.

I walked around the cabin. Everything was a little run-down, but still standing. I felt refreshed, energized, and at the same time, I knew that staying the night in the cabin would probably be bittersweet.

I wondered if the key was still in the main office building where mom would go to rent the cabins. If I could get my hands on it, I could get in without breaking a window. I didn't want to destroy any part of this cabin if I could, but if it was the only way in, I would.

I drifted towards the door, and put my hand on the knob. Unlikely, but, hey, worth a try.

I twisted the knob, pushed on the door, and like a miracle, it opened.

A breathy laugh escaped me, not sure how to react to this pileup of serendipity. I pulled an arm out of my backpack strap, taking a tentative step into the cabin, a slight smile playing on my lips and… found someone already in the cabin.

The good feeling was gone now.

My head cracked against the ground as the person tackled me. Still reeling, I felt someone's knee press against my stomach, and a flash of coppery metal. The next thing I knew, a knife the size of my forearm was pointed at my neck.

Oh, fuck this. _One_ good thing happens, and I get a knife at my neck for the trouble. Was I a serial killer in a past life or something?

"Leave." A voice- female- hissed at me through clenched teeth.

My eyes suddenly shifted focus from the knife, to the owner thereof.

She would have looked like like the stereotypical California dream girl, golden, curly hair, tied up in a sporty-looking ponytail, tan skin, a small nose that a part of me couldn't help but think was cute. But, her face was littered with little cuts and scars, and some of them looked pretty old, way older than four months, and her eyes were an intense, stormy grey that made me feel picked apart and analyzed, that made it difficult to look her in the eye.

A fun fact I had learned about myself in the past for months: In spite of my determination to stay alive, a large, likely very ADHD part of me seemed to enjoy taunting death while I was staring it in the face. It had already landed me into a fair share of trouble, leading bad situations to worse in the blink of an eye. I remember one time I nearly had a finger cut clean off for not knowing when to shut my big mouth. I was pretty sure that someday, I'd be the death of me.

"Fuck off, this is my Cabin." I spat.

Yeah, just like that.

Her eyes narrowed and her lips curled back, in a snarl. "What sort of position do you think you're in?"

Probably dead, if I say so much as another word without a filter.

"Cowgirl."

The look on her face almost made it worth it, (teach her to straddle poor, innocent guys.) for the second or so of dumbfounded shock that was there before she turned into all fury and no remorse. She lifted the knife away from the neck, and drove it into my bicep.

I flinched, waiting for the pain, and the warmth of my blood flowing from the laceration she had given me… but it never came.

I glanced at the knife, the one sticking out of my arm, definitely there. Still nothing. On impulse, I moved my arm a bit. It moved freely, like the knife wasn't even embedded in my arm, and not a drop of blood could be seen, much less a cut.

"That's messed up." I muttered.

Above me the girl hissed something, I didn't quite catch it, but it sounded like a different language. I looked up at her, she regarded me with the respect you give to a leaky trash bag, and pulled the knife out of me. Still no pain.

"So," I said, slowly, casually. "you stabbed me… and nothing happened."

From the glare she was giving me, I was slowly sliding down that scale of respect.

After a few painfully awkward seconds of one-sided (Okay, maybe like, one and a half. She just tried to stab me!) glaring, I sighed. "Are you going to get off?"

Anger flared for a moment before quickly being hidden away by her stony face. She held her glare for a few more seconds before her eyes wrench shut and she pinched the bridge of her nose with her free hand. "_Just_… Go." she flicked her knife to the right, pointing towards another cabin a few hundred feet away. "Go break into that other Cabin, there's no one there."

Anger swelled in my chest again. Who was she to order me around? "I already told you no. You're in my cabin, you go to the other one!"

She scoffed. "_Your_ cabin? This is a rental, it's no more yours than it is mine."

I tilted my head back a bit, digging it into the ground so I could size her up the best I could give my… unfortunate position. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah." She nodded slightly, like she was agreeing with herself, since no one else was going to.

"I was conceived in this Cabin."

Her face flushed red for a fraction of a second and I can see her sputtering. Her eyes tell me the words she failed to spit out were somewhere along the lines of _'I cannot believe you just said that.'_. It did not taken them long to harden again. "What the hell does that have to do with anything? It's my base of operations now, so you'll just have to suck it up and-" She stopped short, and her face drained of color.

She practically vaulted off me into an upright position, her head darted from side to side, and tossed her knife from her left hand to her right, every inch of her body was like a spring loaded coil, ready to snap out at a moment's notice.

"What are-"

"Shhhh!" She hissed and shot me a sharp, angry look.

Just when I was about to try that taunting death habit again, I heard whatever it was that was probably making her so tense. A scraping noise, like metal on stone, and hissing, like a snake, but far louder.

"Get in." She said in a harsh whisper, jerking her head towards the Cabin.

"What?"

"Just _get in_." She said through clenched teeth, flashing me a desperate, but still unapologetically furious look.

Well, I wasn't complaining.

Heaving myself up, and slinging my backpack a little higher up on my shoulder, I walked towards the cabin, slowly, quietly. I had interacted with a few people since the end of the world, and quickly learned that deliberate and slow was the only way to move around anyone, myself included. Any other way would result in constant flinches or readying of weapons. But something about the way she was acting told me I should emphasize the quiet part.

As soon as I had passed behind her, I could feel her slowly walking backwards, practically at my heels. A little unnerving, but I figured, if she wanted to kill me, then she probably wouldn't have used the magic non-stabbing knife. That logic seemed firm enough, or maybe I'd just finally lost it.

The room was dark, the front room of the cabin didn't have any west-facing windows, and with the sun so soon to set, it might as well have been nighttime. I could barely make out any shapes, even as my eyes began to adjust to the dim light.

I was about to get all nostalgic and weepy over the cabin, when a hand, the girls, clasped over my mouth and I heard the door shut quietly behind me. Alarm bells rang in my head, but before I could really react, the hand pulled me back and down, and the girl shooshed in a tone that was probably supposed to be soothing. It missed the mark, just a bit, probably because she probably didn't have a soothing bone in her body. I started leaning back with the pull of the girl's hand, backing up just slightly until we were practically flush.

I glanced back at her, her hand still firm over my mouth, expecting to see her with a rag of chloroform or something insidious, but instead only saw her slowly and carefully kneeling down, that shitty knife still in her hands, but pointed nowhere at me.

"Ssssssisssssster, are you ssssssure you heard ssssssomething?" I could hear a muffled, hissy voice say from outside. It kinda sounded like what you would expect to hear coming out of a cheesy animated snake's mouth, and it would have been vaguely comical were it not for the fact the girl seemed to tense up even more when she heard it.

Whatever was going on, it looked like the girl had some idea of what was happening, so I decided if she was kneeling, I'd probably be smart to kneel too instead of dumbly crouching down.

"Possssssitive," Another voice, this one a little more deep but still more-or-less feminine, in a throaty sort of way.

"Ssssssisssssster, there'ssssss nothing here!"

"No I'm ssssssure I heard..."

"Well did you ssssssmell?"

"... I'm not ssssssure…"

There was a shifting sound like something heavy was scraping against the ground, tearing it up. Then came another, and another, like alternating footsteps. I shot the girl a desperately confused look. Her expression was unreadable, though, I was having trouble seeing it in the dark.

"Not ssssssure?! Ssssssstop wassssssting our time! We have Sssssswept thissssss beach all day!"

"Sssssstop whining. We're here to find demigodsssssss, not relax."

The grip she had on my mouth tightened slightly. Like I was going to open my stupid mouth anyways. I'm not that suicidal, and death certainly wasn't facing me down- yet.

"Maybe… In here…"

I could hear the more vigilant voice musing nearby, scraping grew louder as I could hear her- it, approaching the cabin.

The girl's hand fell off my face and to the door, fumbling with the doorknob for only a moment before turning the little lock on the knob with a click that I knew was quiet, but felt like it echoed through the cabin like a gunshot.

The doorknob turned not even a second later, and the door shook. I pulled myself into a crouch, turning slightly to face the door, just in case the door failed to lock properly, or whoever was on the other side could force it open. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the girl doing the same.

After a few painfully long moments, the door finally stopped shaking.

I could hear a rumbling noise coming from the other side of the door, and I knew it was not friendly.

Or human, for that matter.

I swallowed back a sinking feeling in my gut as the few tense seconds lingered, before I heard the shifting, rhythmic scraps of whatever was behind the door moving away from the cabin.

After I was absolutely certain I couldn't hear anything anymore, I let out the breath I hadn't been fully aware I was holding.

_Then_ the door busted open.

* * *

I hoped to god that the granola bars in my backpack would survive the impact with the terrifying snake woman's face.

The… thing that had been on the other side of the door was nothing short of horrifying. It looked like a woman, provided said woman had skin so dry that it was practically scales, green scales, mind you, reptilian eyes, and two enormous tail-leg trunk things the thickness of telephone poles sprouting from her midsection. Not to mention the fact it was decked out in armor and armed to the teeth (which were very sharp-looking themselves, I must say.) with blades. She was also doing this weird flickering thing, like she would look like a blurry photograph for an instant before coming back into definition, which made looking at her painful, like looking into a blaring strobe light.

Basically, like my 8th grade physics teacher, Mrs. Burtshulk, but a little more ugly and part snake. Throwing my backpack at her face was a neigh-instinctual reaction.

Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk was left dazed by my backpack, and apparently, that's all the girl needed to lung in close and stab her with the shitty non-stabbing magic knife.

She was screwed, I thought, until Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk half-exploded, half-dissolved in a shower of golden light and my mouth nearly touched the floor.

"_Holy shit._" I said.

A hiss that had to be snake for 'I'm going to fucking kill you' sounded from outside, and I heard Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk's sister change at the door.

The girl slid away from the hollow shell of collapsing armor Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk left behind, out of the way of the door and locked eyes with mine. Oddly enough, she wasn't panicking, or was incredibly good at hiding it. "Grab the sword." She ordered, nodding towards the wall opposite to her.

There was an aluminum baseball bat where she nodded.

Okay, really?

Normally, I'd argue with her, but considering recent events, I was willing to go with this girl's orders, since she actually seemed to have a clue what the fuck was going on. I grabbed the bat, not really expecting it to weigh about 30 pounds, dragging it against the floor. I blinked, and took a look at the bat, half expecting something to be attached to it. Instead, in my hand was a sword.

It was the same color as the girl's knife, copper, but brighter, almost glowing. It had a small guard, with one side of it looking like it was partially broken off, and the grip was made of very worn leather. It was doing that weird flickering thing that Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk was doing, but instead of going blurry, it was flicking between a sword and a bat.

I tried to shoot the girl another desperately confused look, but she was focusing intently on the door, and I could hear the monster on the other side not ten feet away, hissing more assumed snake profanities at us. I lifted the sword, placing both of my hands on the grip, and tried to look like I knew what I was doing.

This one was bigger than Definately-not-Mrs-Burtshulk, and she came in swinging with a scimitar in each hand. It was a wonder she fit in the door. She had more armor, and a lot of gold jewelry adorning her body that looked comically gaudy. She was also doing that annoying flickering thing, which I was really hoping wasn't going to become a thing if I survived this.

The girl rolled out of the way as the gaudy snake woman let out a hiss, her snake-legs shaking and rumbling, reminding me of a rattlesnake. With the girl out of swinging distance all of her focus turned on the only other person in the room.

Oh fuck, that's me.

She swung at me with both of her blades, and awkwardly, I shoved the bat-sword in-between me and her swords. When they clashed together, I nearly dropped mine, only just barely holding onto it, as her swords clashed against mine, one only locked in place thanks to the handguard. Numbing pain shot up the my arms, and while I'm far from weakest guy around, this snake woman could probably bench press my old apartment building, and I was not going to win any battle of force with her. Oddly enough, I wasn't dazed by the blow, but instead, I was hyper-aware. The sword-bat stopped flickering and became a definite sword, as did the snake woman, who somehow got more hideous in high-def. She also could do well to invest in some Mentos.

The girl made her move quickly, running for the snake woman with her knife ready, but the snake woman was good, the sword that was uselessly pressed against the guard flew off in a moment, and swung around to meet the girl, who only narrowly blocked it herself, stumbling back, with her knife trembling against the scimitar, her face twisted in pain.

The snake woman let out an unfitting giggle, throwing her head back, it quickly devolved into a throaty hissing laugh. "Sssssso weak!" she crowed. "Give up now, and I will grant you quick death and only mild dissssssmemberment!"

I grit my teeth. She was right. I was barely holding on to my sword, which was a feat in and of itself considering I'd never held one a day in my life, and the girl couldn't handle this behemoth alone. If the agonized expression told me anything, it looks like she might have been wounded before this.

"_Erre es korakas._" The girl hissed through clenched teeth.

Whatever that meant, it got the snake woman's attention as she turned to face the girl, and hissed something at her, I didn't really pay attention, because I was trying really hard to not make my jaw fall to the ground in shock at how _cocky_ this snake woman was.

In the early days, when a lot of people were still in New York, I had gotten into a few fights of the 'to-the-death' variety. Gotten stabbed once, maybe twice or five times, I didn't count. Before then, the worst fight I had been in never got above a few punches, so I had a to learn how to deal with someone who genuinely has no qualms ending my life, it was rough, but I managed.

But, even as an amateur, I quickly learned to never take your eyes off anyone involved. Even that sickly looking kid huddled in the corner can get in a sucker stab that'll be the death of you if you're not aware. When you take your eyes off your opponent; that's when you lose fights. Maybe this wasn't a knife fight like I was used to, and maybe this was my first time holding a sword, but the principal should still hold up.

I was still fighting against the pressure of the scimitar, unsuccessfully, mind you, driven back a centimeter more each second from the weight of the sword.

Well, this has a chance to kill me instantly, but, hey, I was still gonna die if I didn't try it.

I jumped back, letting the sword dip and go slack in my hand, letting it be pushed back by the scimitar. All of the force that the snake woman had been putting into pressuring me was suddenly released, and it threw her off balance. My arms felt like jell-o, but I tightened my hold again and swung wildly for her hand, hoping to god it would at least get her hand off the sword for a second.

Instead, I got her hand off her body. The scimitar clattered uselessly to the ground, with the hand still gripping the hilt.

The snake woman bellowed, and, apparently having not learned her lesson, brought all of her focus back on me. Not missing a beat, the girl parried the sword and tried to lunge for the snake woman again, this time, in her guard, but one of the gigantic snake tails hit her in her midsection, like some sort of snake kung-fu kick, and send her flying back. The girl, somehow, in her flailing, managed to slice open the wrist of the snake woman, and the second scimitar clattered to the ground with another shriek of pain.

Not wanting to wait for her to recover or willing to let her get a sword back in her hand, I lunged, slashing at the snake woman with as much strength as I could, only to get sucker punched by another snake tail kung-fu kick, sword clattering out of my hand and falling flat on my ass.

I blinked, dazed, feeling the weight of the snake woman press down on me with her scaly leg. When my head finally stopped spinning, I saw the snake woman cast a glance over her shoulder, checking on the girl, probably, before turning back to me with a cruel grin of snaggly fangs.

"You Ssssshould feel honored, to die by my hand issssss not a pleassssssure all demigodssssss enjoy." She toyed with the hilt of the sword I had used to cut off her hand, her eyes shifting to it like it was poison every so often.

It struck me how similar the blade was to the girl's weird knife that either doesn't work or worked _incredibly well_. Now that I thought about it, the girl's blade did that soft glowing thing too.

Then, I had an idea. A really stupid one. My mom turning in her grave stupid. But seeing as I was pretty much dead anyways, I had nothing to lose. The girl was probably unconscious on the floor from that hit, or whatever injury she looked like she had earlier was otherwise making it impossible for her to help right now. I was probably on my own, and I was out of other options. Of course, or this plan to even begin working, I had to give into that bad habit of taunting death while staring into it's face. I made a quick promise to myself to kick that habit if I managed to survive, but right now, it might just work in my favor. Might.

"I guess it'll be half as many from how on, huh?" I said with a cocky grin that I tried very hard to make it look shit-eating instead of terrified. The look on her face told me I should be flashing the latter.

An unsettling rumble came from somewhere in the back of her throat, and she narrowed her pupils into incredibly thin slits just before plunging the sword into my sternum.

I flinched, closing my eyes. I think that helped make it convincing, or maybe, because it was just real. In the end it was just a hunch that the sword wouldn't hurt me, a rather weak one at that. I had to hope my hunch was on the money though, because I seriously did not want to explain how I got myself gored to my mom.

I swallowed nervously, waiting. A few seconds passed and I still didn't feel anything. I could hear the snake woman laughing, but it was distant compared to the rolling thunder of my pulse in my ears. After swallowing down my fear the best I could manage, I wrenched open my eyes, and couldn't help but gasp.

The sword was impaled neatly in my chest, and I wasn't sure if my stupid plan worked or if I had just gone into shock. I stared at the sword, and then looked up at the snake woman with smug satisfaction written all over her face. I swallowed thickly, which I took as a good sign, since I wasn't sure if someone with a sword in their sternum could swallow.

With trembling hands, I reached for the blade's hilt. It was just barely short enough for me to be able to grip it firmly, but I'd never be able to pull it out if I was actually skewered.

"Feissssssty, aren't you?" The snake woman above me purred. "I like that in a demigod. I'm ssssssure your friend will be the ssssssame. But, it'ssssss too late for you. Even if you could pull that ssssssword out, you'd bleed out." She let out another one of those creepy giggles that didn't sound right coming from her.

I mumbled some gibberish, wiggling the sword in my hands and felt no pain when it moved around. Just like the knife. Screw my C- average, I might just be a bona fide genius. Or in shock and delirious.

"What wassssss that?" She craned her head in a little bit, smiling down at me

"I said," Trying to make my voice feel breathless and ragged, masking the grin that was threatening to erupt all over my face with a pained expression."Your bling... looks like tacky, plastic, convenience store jewelry."

Her face dropped, as did the penny.

I pulled the sword out of my chest, straight through my lung and rib cage as if they were air, and swung it at the leg that was holding me down.

At the last second, she reared back, but she was too slow. The sword cut through that telephone pole's worth of snake like it was a hot knife cutting into butter. The snake woman fell back, leaving her right leg lying lifelessly on my stomach.

The snake woman screeched quickly rolled over, facing me, her golden eyes bloodshot and her face the picture of hatred. Her eyes darted to the scimitar on the ground with her hand still attached, and she dove for it. Scrambling, I struggled under the weight of the snake leg, shoving it off me while my mind, still trying to figure out if I now had a gash between the left side of my body, was making focusing and breathing a little difficult.

However, the snake woman never got her chance, as the girl jumped on top of her back and with a grunt, slid her knife between the shoulder blades of the snake woman. She let out a short gasp before, _finally_, explode-dissolving into a flash of gold light, taking her massive snake leg along with her, and leaving only gaudy jewelry and foul-smelling yellow powder to remember her by.

My muscles all decided that my adrenaline rush was over, and promptly decided to go limp. I sprawled myself out on the cabin floor, looking up at the ceiling, breathing heavily with aching arms and half-shattered nerves.

After a few blissful seconds of living in a state other than confused panic, my hand shot up to feel at my side, confirming once and for all that I was still in one piece. I sighed, taking a deep breath with both lungs this time, my brain finally seeming to get the picture.

"Percy." I blurted breathlessly. My eyes wandered over to the girl who sat on her hands and knees over the powdery remains of the snake woman, who stared at me in a way that did not feel wholly friendly. "Percy Jackson."

After a few seconds, I finally saw her shoulders slump, just the tiniest bit, and she sighed.

"Annabeth Chase." She said as she shifted into sitting, legs crossed and her knife still in hand.

I grunted, pushing myself up off the ground and into the fetal position, the sword left on the floor. I stared at the door, as it swing slightly from the sea breeze, for god knows how long, until words finally bubbled through my mouth, unbidden.

"Thanks," I blurted, caught in a half daze. I felt my cheeks go hot, but I kept staring out the door, hoping she wouldn't notice if I played it cool. "For making them explode. Couldn't figure out how to do that."

"You're taking this surprisingly well," She said, her tone somehow managing to be casual and suspicious at the same time. "Was this your first time seeing one?"

I let out a short, airy laugh that cracked about halfway through. "No," My voice was unsteady as I shook my head, playing out the scene in my head over again, the surreality of it finally crashing down on me. "Can't say I've ever seen one of those…"

"_Dracaenae._"

"Dracowhatevers." I snapped, making an abrupt, dismissive gesture in her direction. "First time seeing them. And, trust me, I'm not taking this well. I just have been a little too busy trying to survive to actually freak the fuck out like I've wanted to." I ran my hands through my hair, and mussed my hair once they reached the back of my head.

I shot the girl a panicked look, and swallowed, which felt a lot like trying to down a cotton ball. "Do you mind explaining everything that just happened because I'm having a little fucking trouble figuring this shit out."

She sighed, like me freaking out was wearisome to her. "Just calm down,"

"Don't fucking tell me to calm down!" I shouted. "I just fucking cut off a snake woman's snake leg and that's not even the most fucked up part of this!"

She raised an eyebrow at me, though only slightly, her face otherwise impassive and guarded, and we had a staredown. After a few good, long, infuriating seconds, she closed her eyes, and sighed once more, this time, throwing her whole body into the action, relaxing tense muscles. When she opened them again, her expression was no longer so guarded. She still seemed annoyed, but not in a bored way, more of a sympathetic kind of annoyed, like she understood why I was acting the way I was, but made no effort to hide the fact that she felt I was being unreasonable.

"You want an explanation, right?" Her voice sounded a considerably more relaxed, and she moved her body slightly along with her words.

I nodded.

"Well, then let's close that door and get some seats. This is gonna take a while." She dragged a hand down her face, suddenly looking wholly tired.

* * *

_AN: Told you It'd be longer._


	3. A Little Post-Modern Ancient History

Neither of us looked like we wanted to close that door, but Annabeth not being capable of standing was a pretty convincing argument.

Not that she didn't try, because she certainly did, but the second she tried to put any pressure on her left leg, she crumpled. I could see blood beginning to stain the leg of her pants about down the shin. An old gash must have opened up sometime in the fight, and judging by the amount of blood that had already soaked through her pant leg, it must have been a nasty one.

She made a face and spit out some more of that foreign language(latin, maybe?) she used when she was unhappy, rolling up her pant leg carefully, wincing as she went. Eventually she pulled the pant leg all the way up to her knee, leaning down for a closer look at her bloodied leg.

If a cut could be furious, hers definitely fit the bill. It probably went deep, almost to the bone, around the edges it was crusty with scabs, and the skin surrounding it was red and puffy. It looked like she got it recently, and had probably just closed up naturally, and hadn't got anything close to treatment in the meantime.

Her head suddenly snapped to me and we made eye contact. She must have realized I'd been staring. Great, now she probably thinks I'm a creep, if that stupid cowgirl comment didn't make her think that in the first place. Oh, god, why did I even say that? I know I'm stupid, especially when I'm about to die, but that was a completely different level of stupid.

"Shit," I breathed, trying to shake away the nervous electricity lingering from the attack mixing with the sudden flush of embarrassment. "Shit, hold on, just, hold on." I heaved myself back on my feet, stumbling for a moment before i got my bearings.

I squinted at the door and saw my backpack lying next to a pile of gold dust that Definately-not-Mrs-Burtshulk left behind.

I looked back at Annabeth and held out my hand in a stopping motion. "Hold on," I repeated, dumbly, trying to sound reassuring. She raised an eyebrow and opened her mouth like she was about to say something, but I broke eye contact before she could begin, walking over to my backpack, and fishing it out of the pile of gold dust, and shaking off whatever residue clung to it.

I closed the door, giving the lock a little turn, which somehow worked, much to my pleasant surprise. I slug the backpack onto my shoulder, zipping it open and rummaging though it's contents as I shuffed nearer to Annabeth, eventually flopping down beside her. Out of the corner of my eye I could see her tense up and grip her knife a little tighter, but I ignored it.

Eventually, within the mess of granola bars(only slightly crushed, by the looks of it) I fished out the box of gauze, and the bottle of antiseptic spray. I uncapped the bottle of antiseptic and gave it a little shake.

"This'll sting," I mumbled, spraying a quick line down the length of her wound, earning a quick, quiet hiss from the girl. "couldn't get the nice stuff." I re-capped the bottle and placed it carefully back into the bag.

"That's fine by me." She said quietly. I could feel her studying my actions, waiting for me to make a wrong move. I couldn't blame her, I would do the same thing in the opposite situation. I opened up the box of gauze, tearing at the cardboard, and peered inside. Four rolls. I'd have to use it a bit sparingly if I wanted it to last, but that gash was a problem that needed attending to.

"You don't have to-" She started, her annoyed tone telling me that I had been staring at the open box long enough to look hesitant about helping her.

"It's fine." I waved her off, pulling out a roll from the box and slowly, carefully, beginning to dress her wound. If I wanted to bandage this thing remotely right, was going to need the entire role to tie it tightly, with no medical tape to secure it. It didn't bother me too terribly though, not after she just saved my ass, and especially not if she was going to explain everything to me.

"You've never dressed a wound before, have you?"

I blinked, not realizing I had been spacing out. What little work I had done on her leg was messy and looked like it was barely going to function as a bandage. I looked away sheepishly, and coughed. "Ah, well… No. No, not really." I didn't need to be looking at her to know she was rolling her eyes.

"You repeat yourself a lot." She said dryly, dropping her knife and taking hold of the bandages and shooing my hands off of them. I watched her bandage her gash with almost professional grace that had my cheeks flush in embarrassment. "Where'd you get these by the way?"

I took the box and tossed it back into my backpack, zipping it closed, shrugging. "Spent a few nights in a Rite Aid in Queens. Found both under some rubble in the stockroom. Most looters are actually pretty bad at leaving no stone unturned."

"And you are?" she asked with a grunt, knotting the gauze and securing it into position, with a fair amount of it still usable. She cut off the surplus with her ever-inconsistent knife, holding it out for me.

I shrugged again. "I'm more stubborn than most, at least." I took the leftover gauze and shoved it into the first little opening on the backpack I found that could fit it, which happened to be a little pocket on the strap.

"Well, thank the gods for that," She muttered, smoothing out her dressings and placing a cautious amount of weight on her leg. Pain twitched across her face and she _tsk-_ed.

"Can you even walk?"

Her grey eyes flashed angrily at me for a moment, and I could feel her barriers going back up, it was a struggle to not flinch on reflex. I wondered if I had somehow insulted her, but slowly, she exhaled, and the flash of anger slowly faded into the background noise of her impassive face. "Not as much as I'd like to be able to," She admitted slowly. "But I could if I needed to."

I scrunched my face and pursed my lips, studying her, glancing down at the ginger way she positioned her leg, and how quickly she rectified it when she caught me staring. Eventually, I sighed, shrugging my backpack higher up on my shoulder, and holding out my arms, opened palmed. She stared at them for a second, then threw me a perplexed expression. I groaned.

"C'mon."

"'C'mon' what?"

"You can't walk. I'll carry you."

She gave me another blank expression, studying me, before the corners of her mouth quirked up in the slightest of smiles, and she snorted. Like a splash of ice water to the face, I came to the abrupt realization that she wasn't just pretty, but seriously beautiful. She wasn't perfect, far from it, little scars old and new littered her body all over, but somehow, that made her look better. It's like the little smile drew all the imperfections together and smoothed them out, made her feel natural and beautiful at the same time. I felt like a cloud of butterflies had emerged somewhere in my large intestine. And this was just a _half-_smile_._ My mouth may have dropped just a bit.

"With those arms? Bridal style?" She said, shaking me out of my stupor. When I focused back on her, she had an obnoxious all-knowing, amused look on her face that shattered the golden image that I had just peaked at, and I scowled."Please, I can see them trembling. You botched the block in that fight and tried to stop the force instead of bending with it and parrying. You won't be carrying anything of significant weight for another few hours at least."

My eyebrows knit together, and my jaw locked as my lip threatened to curl up in a snarl. "Well maybe if you didn't leave me in the line of fire- swords, whatever, then maybe I would be able to carry you."

Her smile shattered, and a small part of me mourned the loss of that beautiful girl as the grizzled, angry one with the sour face came back."You're going to blame _me-_"

"You're the one who just told me to grab the fucking sword without _any_ explanation." I interrupted, my hands retreating to my sides as balled fists.

Her eyes narrowed."Well, excuse me for not having the time to train your sorry ass on swordplay when I was busy trying to save both of our lives."

"Oh yeah, you were doing such a fine job on your own with this." I said, rolling my eyes and jabbing a finger at her bandages

"I wouldn't have had to do _anything_ if you hadn't gotten all sentimental over this stupid Cabin and gone over to the other one."

"Listen here Chase," I growled, leaning in closer to the girl, grabbing her arm. "This cabin isn't stupid." I tried to sound intimidating, or at least tough, but my voice faltered near the end.

I imagined my mom's face, wrought with concern, pursing her lips, her eye prying for any answers she could get before she actually asked what was wrong. She hated seeing me upset, especially when we were at Montauk. Montauk was supposed to be our little escape, when things like being a low income single mother, or being the son of a low income single mother with no academic future in reasonable sight became too much to carry. It was a place where all the worries of the city weren't supposed to touch us.

I took a deep breath, closing my eyes, blocking out Annabeth Chase. I needed to calm down. I was _not _going to lose it here.

I wrenched open my clenched fist, exhaling, and opened my eyes again, seeing Annabeth Chase, in all her fully guarded glory, leaning away from me, her hand raised like rubber band ready to snap. I released her from my grip with a sigh, looking away.

Tension rippled in the air, and like a wave it crumbled down on itself, turning into a harmless splash of sea foam. I looked down, and took another deep breath. I glanced up at her again, and she was eyeing me warily again, but the hand that had been raised was slowly falling back down to her side.

"Sorry, I shouldn't have grabbed you. It's just…" My fingers itched for a distraction, twitching wildly and painfully in hopes for something to come in to occupy them, but nothing could be found. "Me and my mom used to come here."

Recognition lit up on her face, and that seemed to bring her down just a bit. Thankfully, I didn't think I needed to explain any further, and hell, after my walk on the beach, I don't think I could. Everything still felt raw, even if my walk along the beach seemed a million miles away from where I was now.

I shuffled over to her side, and stretched an arm behind her.

"What are you-" She snapped, tensing all over again. God, she was touchy.

"You said I wouldn't be able to carry you bridal style, right?" I cocked my head to the side giving her a weak smile. "If you can't walk on that leg, then this the best I can do. Now, could you lift up your arm? This won't work without your help."

She stared at me, no saying a word, still calculating, and analyzing with that prying stare, but she lifted her arm for me nonetheless, picking her knife up from the floor in the process. I slipped my hand under her armpit and scooped her up, my other hand floating outwards stiffly in case she needed something to balance with, which, naturally she didn't. After a second of unsteady shifting on her feet, she found some relatively stable footing. She could probably make do with hopping if she needed to, but I'd been raised better than that.

"Room in the back has a bed." She muttered, testing a little weight on her bad leg.

"I know. It's my cabin, remember?"

"Keep telling yourself that, Jackson."

"Keep trying to deny it, Chase." I shot back. The words we shared should have felt light, almost friendly, but it was muddled by the lingering tension between us. You'd think that going through a life-or-death experience together would bond us for life immediately, or something, but, there was still a deep rift, and we were still strangers who barely knew each other's names.

We walked through the little dining room/kitchen of the cabin and it felt like a punch to my solar plexus. The room was brighter, golden rays of the setting sun filtering in through cracks in the closed blinds, giving the room a dim glow. The dining table was still there, but instead of the warm plate of blueberry pancakes that I had been used to, it was littered with paper, all running over each other and overlapping into a chaotic mess that reminded me far too much of my mom's desk in the few weeks before she sent in the copy of her novel that was approved for publication. Aside from that small detail, everything else was exactly how I would imagine it, a bit dusty and dreary, but that aesthetic came with the apocalypse.

We moved deeper into the cabin, down the hallway that lead into the rooms, and end of it I could see a door open, with a soft, unnatural glow coming from inside it. I stopped short for a quarter second. That was the room my mom would sleep in. I felt something approximately the size of a raccoon nest in my throat at the thought of entering it.

Annabeth, never missing a beat, spared a glance my way. "Something the matter?"

"S'nothing." I murmured, not willing to spare the glance back as I felt her eyes burning into me a little more so than usual. But thankfully, she didn't press.

When we hobbled into the room, the green lantern made me do a double-take.

The room was warm, far warmer than it had any right to be. The cabin was warmer than it was outside, since the ocean wind couldn't get in, but the cabin had never been built with the intention of people staying during the winter months. There was insulation, but it was minimal, and certainly not enough to warrant the sudden want to shed my jacket, and maybe the ratty sweatshirt I had underneath it as well. It was at least a good 60 degrees Fahrenheit in this room, and from what I could see, theonly possible source of heat was the small handheld lantern that glowed with green light.

Annabeth's elbow dug into my side. "Keep moving, or you'll be getting no explanation."

I gave her a sidelong glance, snorting, then turning my attention back to the lantern for another moment before shaking my head. After the day I've had, I was more than willing to just accept the magic green lantern without complaint. It made the room comfortable.

Together we walked the remaining few steps to the queen sized bed that had once been designated to my mom. The floorboards creaked in a belated 'welcome home' from the cabin. The same mattress was on the bed that I had always known, with that little, almost indistinguishable stain on it's side facing the entrance. We sat down on the side of the bed and I could hear her huff out a very subtle sigh she probably thought was hidden by the groan of the mattress.

The two of us untangled, and shifted away from each other. I slung my backpack onto the floor as she shifted back to put her bad leg up on the bed, re-inspecting the bandage. I started to pull off my jacket, before I remembered that the little flick knife I had been using was still securely in it's pocket.

I cast a quick glance over at Annabeth as she started to settle in, her knife lying at her side while she fussed with her wrappings, and I had to ask myself; Would she trust me now if she knew I had a weapon in my pocket, one that actually stabbed without fail? Do _I_ trust her enough to be unarmed?

Immediately, the voice of my mom started nagging in the back of my head. '_Percy Jackson! I cannot believe you would be so ungrateful to this lovely young lady for saving your life.'_

Oh yeah, lovely, I thought, it sure was lovely of her to stab me that first time.

The little voice came back softer this time. I could almost imagine her giving me a small smile, humoring my objections with just the tiniest hint of amusement that told me she did not approve in the gentlest way one can. '_Just try, okay Percy? She's giving you a chance, isn't she? The least you could do is try give her one too.'_

I couldn't help but smile just a bit at that. Yeah, that's exactly what she'd say. Silently, I told her voice that I'd try my best.

Falling back into the pattern of slow, careful, and deliberate movements, I fished the knife out of my pocket, and gently tossed it a few feet away from the bed, it landing against the floorboards with a soft _clink._

Annabeth gave me a scrutinizing look, eventually turning into something I would almost be crazy enough to consider impressed. I pulled my jacket off, and draped it on the bedpost. She rolled the leg of her pants back down, and a silence passed between us that was only a _little _tense, almost easy. Of course, it didn't last for more than a few seconds, but it was a miracle for edgy nerves. Annabeth was the one who decided to break the silence.

"So," She said, slowly, lacing her fingers, and toying with them idly. "I think it would be best if I started from the top, or otherwise, it probably, er, scratch that, it _definitely _won't make any sense."

"Alright," I nodded.

"Alright,"She echoed, her face scrunched up and her eyes flicked away, like she was thinking hard. It totally wasn't adorable. "What religion are you?"

I blinked. "What?"

"I asked what religion you are."

I gave her a look. "No, I get that, but, what does it have to do with anything?"

"Just answer the question, and I'll explain." She said, rolling her eyes.

"Look, I don't know, I never really thought about it." I shook my head, sighing harshly. "I celebrate Christmas."

"So you're Christian?"

"Not really,"

"Ugh," She groaned, tapping a finger on her knee impatiently. "Are you always this obtuse?"

I was pretty sure I wasn't an angle, so I didn't bother with a response. Though she must have caught my utterly lost expression, because she rolled her eyes again.

"Look," She said, shaking her head. "I'm not good at this, I'm not used to explaining this to people, just helping a few deal with it after they've had the news broken to them, so I'm just going to say it, alright?"

I nodded slowly.

"You know the Greeks myths, right? The Olympians, the heroes, the monsters."

"Uhh," I made a noncommittal gesture, shrugging. "Kinda, I guess."

I remembered a few from ancient history lessons from school. One of the few things that made history classes bearable were all the stories and myths we got to learn. That, and the fact that math reading were minimal in history classes in comparison to most other classes.

"They're real." Is what I heard, but I was certain that I had heard her wrong. I leaned back, turning all of my attention to her dangerously straight face.

"What?"

"The Olympians, the heroes, the monsters, all of them, real. All around you, in your daily life, they have been living, existing, fighting, warring, without you even noticing, but they're all real." She said, her face still the picture of stoicism.

A bubble of nervous laughter escaped my mouth, and I was suddenly wishing I had a T-shirt that read: 'I'm with crazy'. "What?" I repeated.

"I'm not repeating myself a third time." She huffed, crossing her arms and shooting a very unimpressed look my way.

I looked at her eyes. Grey and implacable, like a rock. I didn't see any hint of amusement on her face, and my psycho-detector was giving me infuriatingly mixed signals. What she said was crazy, but everything else about her all pointed to sanity. "But that's, that's impossible." I stammered.

Her lips puckered, and her eyebrows raised up slowly. "Really? After everything that just happened to you, you're still going to say it's impossible? I remember the phrase 'I cut off a snake woman's snake leg.' coming from you a minute ago, but the gods being real is where it becomes impossible?"

"That's," I tried to gasp out an argument. But there really wasn't one. there was no way to describe the snake women, except for monsters. "Thats…" I repeated numbly, my mind trying to clutch at an argument that refused to be found.

Normally when someone talks about monsters being real, you just blow them off, because monster are, well, monsters, not really anything. Just something kids are afraid live under their bed and don't pay rent. But the snake woman, that _was_ a monster. I had just removed the limbs of a monster. And as if that wasn't weird enough, I had been stabbed in the chest by a monster, and there wasn't a single scratch on me that would indicate that was the case.

And if monsters are real, then who's to say that she's not being serious?

"But," I said, before my mind could follow up with more words, leaving a lengthy pause Annabeth graciously allowed. "How did we… not know? Those snake women- you don't just _not _notice something like that. How could I- anyone- not know about that?"

"The mist."

"The what?"

"_The mist,_" She hissed, her fingers twitching and leg bouncing impatiently. "it's a veil that prevents mortals from seeing what's really going on and gives them something they can process rationally." she paused, her eyes going over to her knife, and her hand picking it up a moment later. "Tell me, what do you see?"

Confusion must have been permanently etched into my face by this point, because I tried to give her a confused look, but my face didn't move. "Your knife?"

"I mean _specifically,_" She spat, like she had explained it clearly to begin with. "Describe it to me."

Reluctantly, I complied, only to find it was doing that thing, the flickering thing the snake women and the bat-sword did, but it was always a knife. It was switching between a coppery double-sided knife, more of a dagger, really, and an impressively long and sharp silver steak knife.

"How are you doing that?"

"That's the mist." She said, squinting at her knife-dagger thing for a moment before a slight recognition flickered across her face and she returned her eyes to me. "You can easily process me holding a steak knife as a weapon, a bronze knife is more difficult to rationalize. Your mind questions it, so the mist shows you something easier. I'd bet the sword you were using earlier didn't look like a sword at first."

"It was a baseball bat before I grabbed it, but..."

"Exactly," She nodded. "now, normally, the mist is pretty much ironclad for mortals, but from what I can guess, the mist is deteriorating. So when something starts to have direct relevance to you as a threat or to counteract a threat, your sense of self preservation is able to overpower the mist and show you what's actually going on. Normally, even if they're being attacked, mortals won't see monsters as monsters, just something else they would see as threatening."

I tried to let that sink in. People, people I could have known, could have been attacked or even killed by monsters, and no one was ever the wiser. I leaned over the side of the bed, cradling my head in my hands as I let out a shaky breath. "That's so fucked up." I shook my head, staring at the floor. "That's _insane._"

"Though," Annabeth muttered to herself, like words were leeching from her thoughts to her mouth. "why now? Did something happen to Hecate or do they just not…" Her eyes caught mine for a second, and she must have realized I was already confused enough without her mumbling. She waved at me dismissively "Nevermind that, It's nothing."

I shook my head, returning it to my hands. I needed to get it together. So, sure, there could have actually been monsters in my closet when I was a kid, or maybe that snake woman actually _was _Mrs Burtshulk, but I survived so far. I could handle this. I still needed to know more anyways, so I would have to deal with it.

No matter how fucked up it is.

"How do you know all of this?" I asked eventually, releasing my head from my hands. "How'd you figure it out?"

"I've always known." She said, just a little too quick and too cold for me to not raise my eyebrows. "It's been my life since I was born."

"You're not about to rip your face off and tell me you're actually a monster too, right?"

She leveled a glare at me, that looked downright homicidal. I put my hands up, rearing back. "It's a joke, chill! I'm still trying to figure all this out, so It's not like I know any better."

She huffed a stray lock of hair from her face, before turning away. I got the distinct feeling like I was about to get the silent treatment, which was directly opposed to my plans. Anger burned lowly in my chest. It was just a stupid joke, why'd she have to be all temperamental over it?

Maybe she was… well, on 'shark week', you know? That couldn't be fun. Even my mom could be worn a little thin during her special time of the month. Take into consideration that Annabeth seemed to hold triple the aggression my mom had in her whole body in her pinky finger, and the fact that it was the apocalypse so she probably didn't have any- actually, no, shut up, brain,

I was stopping that train of thought, ADHD be dammed.

"So," I faked a little cough, covering my mouth with one hand and scratching at the side of my head with the other. "You didn't really answer my question, about how you figured this all out."

"Yes I did." She said as she folded her arms

"Not really…?"

"But I did. I told you I always knew."

"That's not _really_ an answer."

"Fine. I don't remember a time when I didn't have at least some idea. Is that enough of an answer for you?" The tone of her voice made me feel like I was starting to walk directly into a minefield. Curiosity whined against my skull like some neglected dog, pawing at the back of my head. Thank god I'm not stupid enough to listen to myself.

"Fine..." I sighed. I didn't want to give in so easily, but the two of us weren't exactly on the best terms as it was, and I felt like if I pushed too hard I was going to get locked out. I'd bring it back up later.

My eyes caught that flickering knife of hers, and I was reminded about how I had nearly gotten myself gored earlier. I then realized with a jolt that I had _forgotten _that. I mean, sure, today was a day of surprises, but come on.

"… What about your weird knife?" And the sword? I think they made me, like, Stab-proof, or something."

I could see her hand drifting idly towards her weapon. I had to keep reminding myself that it couldn't hurt me in order to keep myself from tensing up… of course i had no way of knowing if it REALLY couldn't harm me, but I tried to ignore that.

ADHD part of my brain said no, It's time to imagine explode-dissolving into gold dust.

However, Annabeth seemed little relieved by the question and she shoulders relaxed as she rolled her eyes. "It didn't make you stab-proof, genius, it just doesn't care enough about you to bother stabbing you."

"They don't care enough." I deadpanned.

"Nope," She said, popping the 'p'. "This knife, and the sword you were using, are both made of a material known as celestial bronze."

"Is this a myth thing? Because I don't remember reading any myths about swords that don't kill you when they stab you."

She directed a withering look my way for a few second before her brows furrowed. "Wait, sword? As in the sword I let you use?"

"Uh,"

"You got stabbed by your _own sword_?"

"Er, well, it was more like I taunted the snake woman into stabbing me with my own sword, I guess?"

She narrowed her eyes, leaning forward slightly,like she was trying to find any indication that I was joking, or maybe she was trying to calculate how stupid she thought I was. Probably both at the same time. She seemed sharp.

"In my defense," I splayed my hands out between us, leaning back just a bit. "I figured we were screwed anyways at that point, and if your knife didn't stab me, and the sword kinda looked like the knife, then maybe the sword couldn't stab me either."

She didn't stop staring intently at me, though now it looked like she was almost angry with me for… some reason. I hiccuped with nervous laughter, words flowing out like vomit in an embarrassing explanation of my poorly constructed plan. When I had finished, she was still staring. I fidgeted. She kind of reminded me of mom, the two times she had actually gotten a little more than halfway mad at me.

"It, uh, worked out fine though, right?"

"I'm not sure if you're the biggest idiot I've ever met, or just a savant for making the stupidest possible strategy that miraculously works"

"A servant to stupid plans…?" I asked, bewildered.

"A _savant_." She corrected with a sharp sigh. "Someone who has a high natural aptitude for a very particular field. In your case, probably suicidal plans. Next time, when your plan of action is 'Oh, I'm gonna let this monster stab me because the sword I'm using _looks _like it might not actually be capable, then wing it from there', buy time until you think of a less awful plan, dumbass."

I nodded dumbly. In spite of the fact that her words were harsh, I could see a little glint in her eyes, almost like she was impressed, if only a little.

Shit, that made her look pretty again. Now's not the time to think about how her grey eyes were actually really cool looking when they didn't have the settings locked in death stare mode, and actually didn't ruin the California dream girl thing as much as it made it different in a good way just like the scars.

Why did the crazy, Greek myth squatter girl in my Cabin have to be attractive on top of violent and pretty clearly smart? I think that's unfair.

"Right, so, why did my plan work, exactly?"

She blinked, like she had completely forgotten where this conversation originated. "Right, so, celestial bronze," She glanced at her dagger that she had been toying with. "Celestial bronze is incredibly hard, far harder than regular bronze, easily capable of cutting through steel, can kill a monster in a single solid blow, and even harm a god, if you're suicidal enough to try. It's the weapon of choice of anyone dealing with anything you would recognize as a 'myth'.

"When it comes to mortals though, well, as far as the blade's concerned, you're just not important enough to cut. Watch." She opened her hand out to me, gripping the knife in the other. I must have cringed, because she rolled her eyes at me. "Oh come on you baby, it' not like you haven't done this before."

Okay, that was hard to argue with. "Doesn't mean I'm looking to have it happen again." I grumbled, as I begrudgingly offered my arm to her. She took me by the wrist, and brought the knife down on me, carving up my arm like it was a piece of meat. Just as before, it didn't even tickle, but I couldn't stop my breath from hitching at the sight. It was… eerie, to say the least.

"Only the act of trying to cut you will make the celestial bronze fail to interact with you." She explained, pressing the flat of the blade on my skin and pressing it in lightly. "As such, celestial bronze weapons can bludgeon, but not cut mortals. Not that there are more than a small handful of celestial bronze weapons made for bludgeoning " She dipped the pressure into my skin, and the knife ghosted through my arm, sending a shiver up my spine

I withdraw my arm, rubbing in the places she sliced, or would have, clenching my fist. "That's still so messed up."

"Considering you were impaled, I'd figure you'd be over it by now." She shrugged.

I shrugged back, still rubbing my arm, confirming that, yes, it definitely wasn't the bloody stump that everything annabeth had done with that dagger would have normally reduced it to. "Hey," I muttered after a pregnant pause. "Why'd she stab me with the celestial bronze anyways? Shouldn't a monster, like, know this stuff?"

Annabeth didn't say anything for a long while. I don't know what she was thinking, but when I finally looked away from my arm, she had that analytical look plastered on her face again. She stopped staring almost immediately. "She must have just thought that you weren't a mortal."

"Well then, why did you stab me?"

"... Not everything that looks mortal actually is."

"You hesitated."

"So?"

"So what else could I have been aside from a 'mortal', or whatever?"

She looked away. "Who knows."

"You, probably." I said, my voice hard.

She glanced back at me, her icy demeanor returning with twice the force, chilling the room temperature by at least five degrees. I swallowed. She was like one of those popular girls at school who were in their senior year, but about ten times more terrifying because not only did she look _way_ smarter, she also looked like she didn't only end social lives.

"Look," I broken the silence eventually, my mouth long gone dry. "I don't know why you're so touchy about this, when you were the one who offered to explain things to me in the first place. I can understand if you don't want to tell me everything, hell, I'd probably be happier if I knew less than I already did, but, it's way too late for that." I took a deep breath. "So I need to know; all these Greek myths being actually real, and anything related to it, does it have anything to do with the world ending."

She appeared thoughtful for a second, before nodding slightly. "Yes. Though, I wouldn't call this the end of the world. It's more like the end of an era."

I sucked in another deep breath, slightly shakier this time. "Alright."

"Alright?" She raised an eyebrow, frowning, and gesturing for me to explain what that was supposed to mean.

My mouth felt like it was rapidly filling with cotton, but I ignored it and spoke as firmly as possible.

"Then I'm staying with you."

* * *

_**AN: Percy you doof, you can't just ask people why they know about Greek myths living among us.**_

_**Not gonna lie, this chapter had me struggling a bit. I actually intended for it to be much longer, but I couldn't get it to flow right after the end, I must have done like 5 different conversational pathways and they all dissolved into awkwardness. Oh well, baby's first cliffhanger it is. **_

_**In other news, I'm looking to make bi-weekly updates. I'm a bit of a slow writer, being ADHD myself I find focusing on writing for an extended period of time to be fairly difficult. If I can manage to focus myself, then I'll release the chapter earlier, but no earlier than a week after the latest update. Sound fair? Good, because it is.**_


	4. Spat Out Like Old Granola

"_Then I'm staying with you."_

If I thought Annabeth was closed off before, she rivaled fort Knox right about now, if fort Knox could manage to be on full lockdown while also having it's jaw hanging open in shock. Not that I really blame her. I had just said what was quite possibly the worst combination of words to ever come out of my mouth, given the circumstances.

Of course, it didn't take long for her to start looking ten different kinds of pissed off at me.

"_Hades_, no."

I couldn't even begin to question her choice of words, mostly because I was still reeling from my own. God, I'm stupid.

I wondered idly if I should start using 'gods' instead of god, on account of Greek myths apparently being real and still sort of around. We hadn't exactly talked about the gods yet, so I wasn't sure, but she did mention Zeus so- Wait, shit, now's _not _the time to take the long stroll down ADHD lane, I'm just sitting there looking like even more of an idiot than I already made of myself.

I winced. "That came out wrong,"

"There's no _other_ way for it to come out," She snapped, shooting me a glare that could have made a rioter go sane with fright. "the answer is no."

"You already said that." I grumbled.

"And the answer is still a resounding no. Hades, no. _Tartarus_, no." She crossed her arms like the conversation was over or something, but kept on glaring at me without so much as blinking, which was kind of creepy _and _intimidating.

I rubbed my hand against my face and sighed. Maybe I could pray to the Greek myths for patience. There had to be a Greek god for that, they had a god for practically everything. I wonder- _no! focus goddamn it._

"Look-"

"No."

I scowled. "I just-"

"No."

"Would you-"

"No."

"Can I-"

"Stop? Yes, you may."

"Annabeth, could you-"

"No."

"For fuck's sake,"

"My sentiments exactly."

I grit my teeth and I could feel anger rising in my chest. I know that post-apocalypse isn't exactly the time where second chances come cheap, but she was being ridiculous.

We held each-other's glares in silence for god knows how long, but eventually I realized that this angry staring contest wasn't getting me anywhere, especially when she was totally kicking my ass at it. I was starting to wonder if Annabeth even needed to blink.

"Anna-"

"No."

I threw my hands up in the air and slapped them on my thighs as they dropped them back down. The clap echoed uncomfortably through the silent cabin. I shifted back, rolling my shoulders in order to relieve a bit of the tension that locked them together. I clenched my jaw, trying to wrestle against my anger as I tried to think of a way to get her to listen for more than a half-second.

_What on earth did I do to deserve this?_ I wondered, running a hand through my hair out of exasperation. I just wanted to stay the night in my cabin, but instead I get snake women, an very snippy blonde girl, and a dwindling chance of being able to sleep in my cabin.

"Funny, I've been wondering the same thing." Annabeth commented dryly, pulling me from my thoughts. I raised an eyebrow at her until I realized she wasn't just throwing out random statement, and she was actually responding to me.

"I… said that out loud, didn't I?" She curled her lip up and nodded, shooting me a look that screamed 'I'm pretty sure you're subhuman'. I wanted to snap at her but then it hit me, that if I had said that to loud, it meant I had finally said something without her interrupting me. Twice, actually. Internally, I shrugged, might as well roll with it. "Well, at least we can agree on that, then."

Her face fell, like the very idea terrified her more than the snake women. "Agree on what?"

I shrugged. "This situation sucks."

She shook her head and rolled her eyes. "We think that for completely different reasons that are in direct opposition to each-other."

"Does that really matter?"

"Yes, because you think this sucks because I said no. I think this sucks because you keep asking. Stop doing that, by the way."

"I don't see why it's such a horrible suggestion." I huffed, running a hand through my hair."I get that I was over the line for just _saying it_ like that, but, am I really that horrible?"

She looked at me like a teacher who had been just given a joke answer who definitely wasn't looking for one. It reminded me of middle school, except my answers weren't jokes, they just sounded like them. "It has nothing to do with you in particular, it's just a bad idea no matter what. We've known each-other for, what, about an hour at this point? If you survived this long as a-" She stopped short.

"What?"

She waved me off. I scoffed, but didn't even bother pressing. It'd get me nowhere, anyways. "Nothing. If you survived this long then I'd expect you to not just blindly trust the intentions of every person you've known for an hour. I'm certain you've had to interact with someone for at least that long in the past four months."

She wasn't wrong. I could recall more than a few instances where I'd spent time with people without any violence or bad blood shared between me and them, but things were never really anything less than tense. I remember one time I had taken shelter in a Chinese food place while a group of rioters were going ballistic outside for nearly two days. I was stuck there with a 20 something year old college student named Liz and her eleven year old little brother Jeff. We made a barricade together and set up a sleep schedule so someone would always be awake, and talked a little bit (mostly Jeff talking to me.) but when the coast was clear we barely even said goodbye to each other.

I wondered how they were doing now. I had overheard them talking about going to go to California once. It had been almost three months ago when we had gotten caught together, so I guess they were probably either there by now, close to it, or dead.

Of course, that situation had been entirely different. Liz was none-too subtly brandishing a hunting knife at me at almost every opportunity. Didn't exactly scream trustworthy as much as screamed how she would have no problem gutting me like a trout if I stepped one foot out of line.

Liz was pretty scary, now that I thought about it.

"Yeah," I said slowly. "I have." I fixed my eyes to the knife I had tossed to the ground and then to her. "But, they didn't disarm themselves when they talked to me."

Her eyes went to the knife, her mouth twisted like she didn't have a proper response to that. She shifted uncomfortably as she stared at the knife, her mouth opened wordlessly for a second,

"I have no proof that you're not armed with a different concealed weapon. It wouldn't be unreasonable for you to try to lull me into false sense of security with a disarming gesture." She eventually reasoned.

I squinted at her, my mouth hung open slightly and shook my head. "Did _you_ even believe what just came out of your mouth?"

She stayed silent, instead covered her mouth with her hand and propped herself up on her thigh, hunched over like that famous sculpture of the naked thinking dude. I picked at the creases of my battered jeans silently. I don't think we had been able to talk for more than five minutes without one pissing the other off, and I had to wonder if knowing the truth was really worth all this aggravation.

I clenched my jaw, narrowing my eyes at the little rips that had begun to form on my jeans. I wish I had taken some pants with me before I decided to leave Manhattan.

"Why do you want to… stay, anyways?" Her voice came out muffled, so I couldn't tell what her tone was.

"If I tell you, will you let me?" She raised an eyebrow, nonplussed, and I shrugged. "Worth a shot." I breathed, leaning back, scratching idly at my face. I needed to try to shave.

"Well," I said slowly, unsure of where to start or if I should really tell her every reason. "I want to know the full story of how the world ended. You seem to know what happened, and I doubt I'll ever be lucky enough to find someone else who knows. It's not like I can go around surveying people about weather or not Greek myths are real- people'd think I'm a rioter or something."

She made a face. "A rioter…?"

I blinked. I guess not everyone used those terms. I rubbed the nap of my neck, a little self-conscious. "Yeah, you know, rioter. The people who went crazy from being part of the riots and never stopped being crazy, not all that many left, since the riots turned on themselves, but most people kill them on sight."

Her expression, from what I could see of it, was unreadable. "Right…"

"People only kill them because they think that the craziness is contagious or to put them out of their misery." I said quietly as a slight and unpleasant wave of nostalgia struck me. There were a lot of rioters running around just a few months ago, some of which I even recognized. I shook my head "Uh, anyways, that's not important.

"Aside from all the Greek myths stuff, our chances of survival are better if we have someone else to watch our back, you know? I got sick once. It sucks, trust me. With someone else there, you can focus on getting better and only getting better while they can take care of the more difficult stuff. And, uh, there's some things you might not be able to do with only one person, but with another person it's possible…" I scratched my head. I was starting to feel like a 3rd grader talking about his show-and-tell project, nervous energy in my gut included.

"You seem like the type of person who would join a survival group as soon as you had the opportunity to." She commented dryly, though it sounded more like a question than a statement.

"Well, I didn't," I sighed, a slight edge pin-pricking into my tone.

"Why?"

I got the impression that she did notice the fact I didn't want to talk about it, but decided that she would ask anyways. "Maybe I'll tell you if you let me stay."

She squinted, shooting an unkind smile my way. "Don't flatter yourself. You're not that interesting."

I raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't that mean you think I'm interesting?"

"In the sense that you would find any lunatic, yes. That doesn't mean I want to be around a lunatic, or a rioter, for that matter."

Well there goes my hopes, shot dead and buried in two sentences. I scowled at her. "I'm no rioter."

"Oh, sorry, I thought rioters were crazy people who did crazy things, like, say, suggest two people form a partnership based on one life-or death situation and a discarded butterknife. You seemed to fit the definition."

I made a growling noise in the back of my throat. It wasn't very friendly, but then again, neither was she. "Do you have a smartass reply for everything?"

"Do you know how to tie everything to your stupid suggestion?" She shot back.

"The suggestion that could one day save both of our lives? Yes."

"No, the stupid, unnecessary, selfish one that I already shot down because it's a ridiculous idea."

I reared back, anger rising in me again like I was a hot air balloon. "Selfish?" I stammered, gaping.

She cross her arms and glared a hole into my head. "Yes, _selfish_. Every single reason you listed was just something you would benefit from. _You_ want to know why western civilization is dying. _You_ want someone to be around to take care of your sorry ass in case you get sick. _You _want someone around who can make sure you don't get stabbed in the back in a fight."

"I'm thinking about Survival!" I shouted, leaning in closer to her in a totally not friendly Percy-you-idiot-what-are-you-doing-you-need-her-to-like-you sort of way, our noses inches from each other, and both of our faces screwed painfully in anger.

"No, you're thinking about your own ass, and your own wants, and nothing else." She hissed back at me, her finger poking me in my chest. "You know, now that I think of it, it's probably a good thing you didn't join a survival party, because you'd probably have gotten them and yourself killed because you were only thinking about yourself and did something stupid. I think that's more than enough reason to _never _want to partner up with someone like you. I hope no one has to suffer through that misfortune."

I was breathing heavily and my face burned with about ten different feelings. Anger, shame, regret, and that little annoying nudge that reminded me Annabeth was pretty, to name a few. I gulped down the sensation and grit my teeth to keep it down. "'There a problem with thinking about your own ass?" I asked slowly, my voice tight.

She scoffed, making no effort to hide her disgust. "Please. As if you ever think about anything else _other_ than your own ass."

My stomach felt like a nuclear bomb had just been detonated in my lower intestines, swirling with with noxious fury. I didn't say anything, not trusting my verbal filter to hold against the tons of raw sewage that threatened to burst from my mouth if I started talking. She didn't give a flying mythological fuck about me, or what I wanted, or what I've been through, but she was more than willing to judge me from what little she did know. It reminded me of the teachers at most schools I went to.

No tolerance, no second chances.

Stiffly, I rose up from the bed-my _mom's_ bed- and slowly put on my jacket, and slung my backpack over my shoulder not sparing another look at Chase. I bent over, grabbed the pocket knife I had thrown to the floor, and slipped it back in my pocket, before heading for the door.

"You're welcome," I muttered with a shaky breath, and swallowed. "for the bandages." I hunched over and trudged out of the room- and all the way out of the cabin.

* * *

The second I closed the door behind me, I punched the cabin wall so hard, three shingles fell off.

It felt like I was breathing pea soup as I grit my teeth together so hard my ears started to ring, however that works, I had to wonder just a little bit. I leaned up against the cabin and pressing my forehead against the wood, because otherwise I'd be banging my head against it, and I didn't need another reason to have a migraine.

I seriously fucked that up.

But, can you blame me? Chase was absolutely intolerable. People write books and study about people like her. I think it's called something like, oh, _demonology,_ or something.

So, sure, I wasn't thinking about her or what she wanted. Big whoop, I barely know her. How am I supposed to know what she'd want, anyways? But did that stop her? Like hell, if anything, it seems like she took personal offense to me not knowing how to tickle her pink or something.

And on top of that, she was _wrong_. I didn't give her my bandages so she'd owe me or something, if that's what you're thinking, I just did it because she was hurt. No, it doesn't make sense, but I didn't really think about it much either. I'm impulsive. I just _do _things.

"Fuck…" I breathed, kicking the cabin for good measure. I should probably stop assaulting my cabin.

Eventually, I pushed myself away from the cabin. The sun had just set, by the looks of it, and I could already feel the temperature dropping as night started to creep in on the horizon. I was going to need shelter, and fast.

Well, my cabin is pretty much the last place I'm going to be sleeping tonight. This day sucked a lot more than usual.

My eyes drifted to the sister cabin of my own, and I sighed.

I'd been in there once, when I was younger. A newlywed couple had invited me and my mother over for a dinner while they were on a vacation. They both had wanted a kid, and they spent a lot of time fawning over me and talking to my mom about raising me. The memory was a little hazy, me being only five at the time, but I think the cabin had the same layout as mine, which, hopefully, meant beds.

Granted, I would need to get in first, but that was a small detail when I considered the possibility of a bed. Even if I would probably be plagued with pangs of nostalgia throughout the night reminding me that I wasn't in _my _cabin, the idea of a bed was too good to resist.

I took a quick look around for any straggling snake woman or anything more Greek than a salad, before walking up to the sister cabin.

From a glance,it was a bit more run down than mine. More shingles littered the ground around the cabin, and one of the windows had a bunch of cracks running through it. It would probably be easy to break, if I had to. I peered into the cabin though the broken window, and I groaned as I felt something in my chest shrivel up and drop to my feet.

The inside of the cabin was a disaster. Half of the furniture that should have been there, well, wasn't. I could see random junk strewn about the room, which told me the place had been looted quite thoroughly. Most of the stuff that was still there was electronics and books and picture frames. A bunch of junk that lost it's purpose months ago.

I reached out to the door, and turned the handle, and it creaked open slowly, like it had just been woken up from a deep sleep. This time, there was no one in the cabin, as I stood at it's entrance just me, and the remains of a dusty cabin that had been gutted of anything worthwhile.

It was more than just a little sad, it was downright depressing; It reminded me of one of the abandoned buildings in Manhattan, but far more… _still. _At least the abandoned homes there still had the remnants of life lining them-it was the city after all-rats were everywhere, as well as other little pests, and you could hear the sound of other people in the distance most of the time, even up until I left. But the cabin was lacking in anything that remotely reminded me that just four months ago, some family was probably living here and enjoying the last days of summer vacation together. It was a husk of what used to be a getaway from life, where people could spend their best days, plan children together, eat great food, and sleep til' noon. Now it was necessary shelter from the cold, and nothing more.

After lingering around the door frame for at least a minute, a sharp gust of ocean air urged me inside. I closed the door behind me and scanned the living room. An armchair was upturned and had started collecting cobwebs. I took a step inward, a soft crunch startling me and sending me jumping back into the door. I looked down and saw broken glass lying on the floor, and it only took me a second later to find the toppled over and broken lamp.

"Christ…" I muttered running my head through my hair and pushing it back. The snake women had set me more on edge than usual, and the fact that there were more monsters probably lurking around, well, that wasn't a comfort, either. Crunching the light bulb even further I walked deeper inside to the kitchen.

The tablecloth was gone from the table, definitely now someone's makeshift blanket. The chairs were strewn about the room, and it looks like one was missing. What someone could do with a chair, I'd never know.

I ghosted my hand over the table, leaving steaks in the dust with my fingertips, as I took in the kitchen. Several cupboards were open, and I had no doubts that they were all empty. Even if I was more stubborn than most looters, I knew a lost cause when I saw one. Instead, I moved to the stove, and started fiddling knobs. It was an old-fashioned gas stove, and If I was lucky, there might still be a little bit of fuel left in there. The stove was silent no matter how I fiddled with the knobs, and I took a few experimental sniffs, and was not met with the noxious smell of gasoline. Whoever had been here last had tapped the stove out.

Shaking my head from the delusions of sleeping somewhere above 50 degrees for a night, I walked away from the kitchen and towards the hall the connected the bedrooms. I briefly considered going to the larger bedroom that mirrored my mother's… The very same one Chase had taken to.

I scowled, and walked into the room that mirrored my old one.

Praise Jesus, and the Greek myths too, I guess, there's a bed. One with a bare, obviously bloodstained mattress, but _a bed._ I could be concerned about the bloodstains tomorrow. The rest of the room was still torn apart, dressers ransacked and, oddly, a few seashells on the ground, mostly broken.

The bed was old-looking, and the mattress was more than a little lumpy, but it was way better than the floor or a flattened out cardboard box that I was more accustomed to nowadays. I slung my backpack off my shoulders and tossed it on the bed.

Ducking out of the room, I figured that I had better at least do a quick once-over of the Cabin. Some things might be useful to me, but worthless for someone who was traveling.

The bathroom that was further down the hall offered nothing of value. The shower curtain was gone, and the medicine cabinet behind the mirror contained a single cue tip, which was used.

When I closed the medicine cabinet, I grimaced. I looked terrible. My hair was lifeless, choppy, greasy, and far more tangled than usual. The scruffy monstrosity growing on my face was painful to look at, an odd combination of too long and not mature enough to be thick. I could hardly even call it a proper beard.

I'd never been a big fan of how I looked to begin with, but now I just looked awful. It's not that I was ugly, I just wasn't attractive. I think the fact that I had, unfortunately, inherited my dad's dull, brown eyes. I don't think they fit my face. I would have much preferred to have inherited my mom's bright, blue eyes. The fact that she would say I had his eyes never sat right with me in general.

I shook my head, and backed out of the bathroom, all the way down the hall to the room that mirrored my mom's.

First thing I noticed was the rug. I could totally use that for a blanket tonight, which was awesome. Second thing I noticed was the mouse, which was less awesome, but he darted across the the room in barely a blink. I just had to hope that this place wasn't infested, and keep my backpack closed at all times it wasn't in my hands.

The room felt lonely. The Queen size bed, even stripped of everything sans the mattress, should have looked more inviting than the single-sized one in the other room, but for some strange reason, it didn't. It felt like I was looking at a slab of concrete rather than a bed. Cold and uninviting.

This room seemed dustier than the others, which made me think that the previous residents hadn't made much use of it, either. It was actually starting to give me the creeps. It was a far cry from my mom's room, despite the identical layout.

Knelt down, and started rolling up the rug, eager to leave the room, and slung it over my shoulder. The musty smell of the rug nearly made me gag, and I was quick to take it off my shoulder, back into my hands. This thing needed some air.

Taking in a deep gulp of relatively clean air, I threw it back over my shoulder and hurried to the front door, and yanked it open. I let loose the carpet, and started airing it out, shaking it forcefully to get the most of the musty sink out of the fibers as I could. I glanced out onto the waterfront. It was completely dark now, sans for the dim illumination the almost-full moon provided, along with the thousands of stars that now lit up the night sky. I had never seen so many stars in the sky as I had since the world ended. It reminded my of Manhattan, in a way, like all the lights of the city had moved to the sky when the city fell into ruin.

_So the world ended, my mom and Paul died, I'm homeless, Winter is coming way too fast, Greek myths are actually real and want to kill me, and I'm basically at the mercy of the blonde menace named Chase. But, hey, the stars are pretty. _I thought bitterly, rolling my eyes.

After a good solid minute of flapping the rug into the open air, I was brave enough to take a whiff. I made a face. It was no bed of roses, but it wasn't completely unbearable, either. I rolled the rug back up, and headed back inside, closing the door behind me, and walked back to the bedroom I was using.

I unrolled the rug on my bed, picking up my backpack as I did so until it was fully uncurled. It was huge, so it kinda hung awkwardly off the sides, far too stiff to hang like a real blanket, but it was still the best thing I'd seen in weeks.

I zipped open my backpack as I flopped down onto the bed, and fished out a granola bar that only felt slightly obliterated from the collision with Definitely-not-Mrs-Burtshulk's face, and made a face. Oats and honey. Again. I seriously should have conserved the fruit-filled ones a little better. One can only eat oats and honey so many times before it starts to taste like sawdust.

Funneling the crushed pieces of granola into my mouth as I opened the wrapper, I laid back in the bed with a sigh, and only one thing on my mind: Chase.

My brows furrowed immediately and a stone landed in my stomach that boiled my insides. It took serious willpower to not crush the rest of the granola bar in my hand.

On one hand, I can get where she's coming from, but on the other, I couldn't help but feel insulted. My suggestion wasn't that bad, honestly, and, yeah, maybe I was thinking of myself, but it's not like anything I listed couldn't potentially be helpful to her, aside from learning about the Greek stuff. One day she'll get sick and then she'll have to be the one stuck quivering in an alleyway, praying to her Greek gods that no one finds her. That'll show her.

Sadly the thought wasn't very satisfying.

Letting my mind wander, I couldn't help but wonder what it was she was doing up here anyways. She seemed pretty no-nonsense to me; the type of person who would have headed south _months_ ago in wake of the oncoming cold. Maybe it was some crazy Greek myth thing.

Maybe _she_ was a crazy Greek myth.

I shook my head, scoffing. Now that would really be something. Being kicked out of my own cabin by a myth come to life. No, Chase had the crazy part down pat, but I don't remember any Greek myths about shrill, aggressive blond girls who steal your cabin and stab you regularly.

Scarfing down the granola bar, I rooted through my backpack again until I fished out a water bottle, and quickly drank the whole thing. I wasn't worried about conserving it. I had another, and I could refill it tomorrow at one of the lakes in the national parks.

I tossed the empty bottle haphazardly into my backpack, and pulled myself under my makeshift blanket, not bothering to take off my jacket or shoes. The rug was itchy, even with all my clothes on, incredibly stiff, and still a little musty, but it was also warm enough to keep on me.

I realized, of course, that come tomorrow, I would have to go back to my cabin and try to talk to Chase again. The thought was dreadful enough to make me wish for sleep to come quick just so that I wouldn't have to listen to every single ADHD cell in my brain prattle on about the infinite amount of ways it could go while breaking off into non-sequitur tangents, not when I barely wanted to go back in the first place.

But, at the same time, I had to. I couldn't just leave without knowing the truth, and not while Chase was still squatting in my cabin. Some things are worth toughing it out for, especially when it's for my mom.

Tomorrow, I would try again. Chase was about to learn firsthand exactly how determined I could be.

* * *

_**AN:... Hey.**_

_**SORRY!**_

_**Yeah, so, I know I said I would be updating once every two weeks, or at least trying to, and this is... about five weeks later. In actuality this chapter took about three weeks to write, but my laptop broke on me the day after I posted the last chapter, leaving me high and dry for about two weeks. I'm not THAT bad, gosh. Set your expectations to ~2weeks and keep 'em that way unless I say otherwise. Stay frosty. Unless you're with me in New England, in which case, warm the fuck up, the snow must be destroyed**_.

_**PS: I will now be updating my progress on the next chapter on my account profile, so if you're curious on how it's going at any time, just check my profile to get a general idea of where I'm at.**_


	5. A Half-assed Halcyon

Dreams always suck after you go through the apocalypse.

Even good dreams suck because you wake up remembering better, more peaceful times that will never come back, or that will never be rebuilt, or worst of all, you dream about people you'll never see again.

Mine was a nice little mix of all three.

I was in my old apartment, but not really, it was kind of like I was looking in on my apartment, like I was out of my body watching sitcom or something. I shuffled into the kitchen, and yawned, the sound eventually dissolving into unhappy grumbles.

Paul was already seated in the kitchen, ever the early riser, newspaper in hand and coffee on the table. He perked up, lowered his paper when he heard me, and smiled mirthfully. "And here I thought Sally said the only thing that could get you out of bed before seven was the jaws of life."

I mumbled something I couldn't even understand and flopped into the chair across from where Paul was sitting, draping myself onto the table. My perspective suddenly shifted to my own body, earning me a lovely view of the table.

"Rough night?" Paul asked eventually.

"Ugh." I breathed out as long as I could.

"That bad, huh?"

"Couldn't sleep at all." I groaned, heaving myself up and leaning back in my chair.

Paul set down his paper, all of his attention on me now, eyebrows furrowed. "You know, if you're not feeling well, you could always just go back to sleep."

I waved him off. "I'm fine; just couldn't sleep. It happens."

He sighed, running his hand through his hair, and dropping it back to the table, tapping impatiently. After a pregnant pause, his shoulder slumped. "I know you have an english test today."

I tensed. Paul wasn't my teacher. Since he was my stepfather, he wasn't allowed to be my teacher under any circumstances due to my school's rules, but he was close friends with my english teacher. I knew that, unfortunately, I was a topic of discussion between the two of them. "Yeah," I ventured cautiously. "I do."

His mouth thinned into a line, looking just a little hurt. "You were studying late, weren't you?"

I shrugged.

"Then you couldn't sleep well because you were worried about the test." He reasoned.

I shrugged again, and I could feel my cheeks go red. I wasn't used to this sort of thing. Paul hadn't been married to my mom for very long, not even a year, and I was still adjusting to the change. Don't get the wrong idea, Paul's great, he's good to me and my mom, but it's still new territory for me. I've never had another parent. Well, there was Gabe, but he was barely a human, much less a parent.

Paul toyed with his coffee cup in the uncomfortable silence, and I fidgeted, drumming my fingers on my thigh, suddenly filled with nervous energy.

"Percy," He sighed. "I know that me moving in and marrying Sally was… sudden," That was true. It had only been seven months after the proposal that they had gotten married, and Paul only moved in with us after he had proposed.

I shook my head at him. "You asked me first, and I'm still cool with all of it. Things are better this way." It was true, when I had turned fifteen Paul had pulled me aside after my party and asked if I'd be alright with him proposing, which I was. Paul made my mom happy, the fact that we got along well was a bonus.

"Right, well," He scratched his cheek idly, not quite looking me in the eye. "despite that, I know that this is a big change for you, and I just want to be sure that you know that, if you needed it, I'm always willing to help. Not as a teacher, but as, well, you know, as your, ah..."

"As my parent?" I completed for him, unable to hide a small, amused smile.

Relief flooded his face, and he laughed. "Yes, that." He leaned in closer, like he was about to tell a secret. "It's not technically against the school's rules for me to help you study as your parent." He leaned back, his expression softening. "You _can_ ask for help, you know. I've had a lot of students far less motivated to overcome their dyslexia than you."

I looked away, if only to distract from the overwhelming sappiness of this awkward stepfather-stepson moment. "I know. It's just, you've already helped me out with it a _lot, _and-"

"And nothing." He interrupted, and pointed at me. "I didn't expect a few tips and tricks I've learned over the years to cure your dyslexia. Every book is different in terms of syntax, and vocabulary, and it will affect your dyslexia differently. It's certainly not a matter of an inability to understand what story the words are trying to convey, your analysis skills are excellent once you can grasp the material."

"Yeah, you've mentioned. Like, fifty times now, or something." I grumbled, and shot him a half smirk to show that it wasn't necessarily unwanted. I took whatever compliments to my intelligence I could.

"Fairly certain It's been closer to thirty, but, I didn't get a degree in English because of my proficiency at math." He smiled down at his coffee, like he was telling an inside joke with someone who wasn't here, my mom, probably.

"But, about that test…" Paul said as he scrutinized me, his mouth twisted like he was thinking hard. "I don't think you'll do well on it if you fall asleep during it. I know I've never awarded bonus point for a student drooling on my papers, at least."

I scowled. "I don't drool."

"While you're conscious, no." He teased, "But, I think that at this point, it's stopped becoming a matter of being worried about an English test to an actual problem of your health. There _is _a flu going around, and going into school with a weakened immune system is begging to spend the next few weeks bedridden."

I blinked at him. "Are you telling me to _not_ go to school?" A teacher was telling me to not go to school. Granted, he's also my stepfather, but still.

"You can make up the test another day." He reasoned, as he took a swig of his coffee. "Your attendance is good for this quarter, so you won't need a doctor's note. Plus, I'd rather you miss one day of classes than see you suffer through this year's flu. I've heard some horror stories already."

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. As tempting of the idea sounded, I was hesitant. "Couldn't you get in trouble for lying?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Do you feel well?"

"Well, not really, but-"

"Well then I'm not necessarily lying, now am I?" He said like it was the simplest thing in the world. "So long as I don't say you were sick, then I'm hardly responsible for how the school interprets me saying that you weren't well enough to attend school." He gave me a wink.

I sometimes forgot how similar Paul could be to my mom at times. Just like her, when he found a rule he disagreed with, he didn't break it, or ignore it, but rather, he moved around it, breaking it in spirit, but never actually breaking the rule. It was quiet, but still rebellious.

"Percy?"

Paul looked over my shoulder, and smiled softly. I turned around to see my mom, radiant as she ever was, even in the bathrobe and heir hair a tangled mess. She covered a yawn with her hand, and walked slowly into the kitchen. "Morning, Mom." I gave her a weak wave and smile.

She pursed her lips, walking right up to me and placing the back of her hand on my forehead. "Percy, are you feeling okay? You're up so early, and- oh, you're so pale!" She leaned down to face me, her eyes searching my face like it would tell her my secrets for me.

"That would imply he went to sleep in the first place." Paul cut me off before I could speak. "I think I'd be alright for him to skip school, just this once."

"You couldn't sleep?" She turned to me, her face creased with worry.

"Test." I mumbled, and shrugged my shoulders like I hadn't just spent most of the night unable to sleep because of it.

"Percy, Paul could have-"

"We already talked about it, dear."

My mom blinked, not even bothering to hide her surprise, and gave Paul a look. He just smiled. After a beat she got this proud look on her face, along with something else I didn't quite recognize. She left my side and leaned down and planted a kiss on his lips.

"And that's why I married you."

"Coffee kisses?"

She smacked him on the shoulder playfully.

I groaned. Just because I was happy with their relationship didn't mean they had to rub it in my face. I was a teenage boy, after all. "I'm gonna go back to sleep." I announced as I stood up from the table.

"I have to go talk to my publisher today, you'll be alright on your own, right sweetie?" My mom asked.

"Mom, I'm just tired."

"Famous last words." She sing-songed.

I rolled my eyes and turned back towards my bedroom. Maybe now I could finally get some _rest_ and deal with the test tomorrow.

"Oh, Percy?" My mom called out from behind my back. I stopped in my tracks and groaned again, just to be difficult.

"What, Mo-" I turned on my heels and my voice choked out when I realized the whole scene of my dream had changed.

I was staring at a locked window, looking into the kitchen, mom and Paul still there side-by-side, and my mom was talking, but I couldn't hear her. I looked down. I wasn't wearing pyjamas anymore, dressed in street clothes, I found myself standing on the fire escape of my apartment. I was suddenly aware of distant shouts and the smell of smoke. The whole dream was tinged orange.

"No," I whispered, and banged on the window. My mom and Paul looked no different, just looking at me expectantly, like they were waiting for me to say something. The smoke got thicker, until I could see it, and heat started choking the air around me.

"No!" I slammed my fists into the window with all my strength, but they bounced off like it was made on concrete. the smoke and fires were closer now, I could feel them. I could hear the cracking of the flames as they got closer and closer. "Mom!" I shouted, my voice spluttering into a cough, choked on the smoke.

Shadows started to fill in the room, wandering about like a crowd, making it harder and harder to see my parents with each passing second.

The fire escape beneath me suddenly disappeared, and I tumbled backwards, the whole dream going pitch black with the exception of the window I was rapidly falling away from. My perspective was ejected out of my body and I could see myself falling.

I screamed as I plummeted into the darkness, going down, down, down, down, all they way. I should have hit the ground a long time ago, but I kept falling. Voices started to fill in the roar of the wind in my ears, until it was only a whistle on my ears.

"Are you an o_rphan?_" On mocked in my ear.

"It's the end of the line." Another echoed from behind me.

"Lost, lost, _lost-_ you cannot _find it_, it's _hidden._" A third yammered from above.

I tried to shout at the voices, but no sound came from my mouth.

"Pathetic."

"We've told you for the last time-"

"You _will_ fall!"

"All this… worthless junk."

"Who gave _you_ the _right_ to live?"

"Little man from the bottom of the well…"

"Just. One. More. Step."

Finally, a voice that sounded familiar in a way I couldn't place on a singular person echoed above all the others.

"What a waste."

Something somehow darker than pitch black swallowed me, and I woke with a start. My head banged against the headboard as I startled awake.

"Fuck!" I swore, and shot up in my bed. I cradled my pounding head with my hands while I tried to slow my breathing down with what felt like a cinder block caught in my throat.

Yeah, dreams suck.

* * *

I hoped oats and honey only tasted like ash after eating them for three consecutive weeks, because as far as peace offerings went, it was as good as I was going to get. I took in a deep breath, straightened myself, and knocked on the cabin door.

The cabins looked different in the morning light, mine especially. Without the long shadows of dusk to steal away the little imperfections of the cabin, I had to wonder how they were still standing.

Cracks littered the windows, though none were broken, they looked like they'd break if you leaned against them even little. The door looked like it had taken several beatings, just barely attached to the hinges, and I don't think Mrs. Burtshulk's scaly twin did it any favors last night, either. There were more shingles missing from the cabin than I originally thought, some in large chunks, making the whole cabin looked like a half-plucked bird. The whole thing looked fragile, like the slightest touch would collapse it like it was a house of cards.

I stretched out, lifted my hands above my head, my fists clenched just enough so the granola bar in my hands wouldn't break. Even if there were more in my backpack, less had survived yesterday's fiasco unscathed than I originally thought.

I knocked on the door again after a minute of waiting. I knew that there was absolutely no way for her to be gone by now. She was pretty well set up in my cabin from what I saw last night, and if that wasn't enough, she was injured. It was going to be at least a few days before she'd be good for long-distance walking with her leg like that.

_Or, she's just ignoring me._ I huffed and tapped my foot a little impatiently. I looked around, trying to quell whatever need ADHD filled me to stay occupied mentally. Too bad there wasn't much to look at. The sea still looked uninviting and cold, old montauk highway was barren and riddled with slightly more potholes than usual. I think I might have seen a tabby poke it's head out of a bush a while's off, but I blinked and it was gone.

My patience quickly waning, I banged on the door, leaving it shuttering. "Annabeth," I yelled at the door. "I know you're in there."

No answer.

Oh, bullshit. I banged on the door harder, until it shook on the hinges, and I was certain I'd break the thing clean off if I hit it any harder. I was getting ready to shout again when the door shook of it's own accord, and I realized I wasn't the only one knocking. I let the door knock on it's own a few times before it finally went silent.

"Annabeth…?" I asked the door.

"Who else would it- ugh, never mind," I heard her growl from the other side of the door. Somehow, I think her mood might have actually gotten worse from last night. Great. "Just quiet down before you attract every monster on Long Island."

I rolled my eyes and sighed quietly. I'd take the monsters in a heartbeat right now. The only time the two of us ever seemed to get along is when we were both in mortal peril.

"What do you want?" I heard her call from the other side of the door, which, of course, he didn't bother to crack open so we could talk like normal people.

I scowled, patience already worn thin and still in a shitty mood from my nightmares. I leaned up against the door so I could better hear her muffled voice. "Oh, not much, I was just wondering if I could borrow a cup of sugar for the pie I was about to bake, what do you think? I want to talk."

"We aren't talking about your stupid idea anymore."

I took a deep, slow breath. Charming as always, Chase. "I'm not here for that. I'm just here to talk about the Greek stuff."

The door stayed silent and motionless, and I shifted awkwardly on my feet. The silence stretched, and I began to wonder if she had just left me standing like an idiot in front of the cabin door. "And, uh, I have granola bars! I was thinking, maybe you might be a little hungry, well, everyone's hungry, but-"

The door creaked open, and revealed a very impatient-looking Annabeth, slightly supporting herself with the door to keep weight off her injured leg. I swallowed whatever words were in my throat as she scanned me, and she suddenly cringed.

"What on earth did you do to your facial hair?"

My hand went up to my face and I could feel heat creeping into my cheeks. It wasn't _that_ bad, was it? "Trim it."

She scoffed. "With what? Your pocket knife?"

"Uh,"

"_Di Immortales, _How are you still breathing?" Her nose wrinkled as she fixed me with a funny look, which I returned.

"Di immor-" I shook my head. "Whatever, alright? Can I come in, or what?"

She gave me another once over, before extending her hand out, palm up. I blinked and stared at it for a second before I heard her clear her throat and I looked up to see her staring at me expectantly. "The granola bar?"

"Oh, right." I tried not to sound deflated, but it didn't really work. Chase had this weird aura about her that made me want to at least look a little bit smart, and I couldn't help but feel like the exact opposite was being made true. I placed the granola bar in her hand, and tried for a weak smile.

She was having none of that though, and quickly shot me one of her unfriendliest glares yet. My fingernails dug into the palms of my hands and I quickly wiped the smile off my face in place of clenched teeth.

She inspected the package in just about every over-paranoid way I could think of. She searched every inch of the wrapping, held it up in the light, shook it around, and even smelled it. After a solid minute of obnoxious sleuthing of her's grating on my already thin patience, I opened my mouth again, "It's not poisoned, opened, the expiration date isn't for another five years, and it's oats and honey flavor. Just figure out if you're gonna eat it or not, already."

She arched an eyebrow at me, unimpressed, and opened the wrapper without breaking eye contact. She pulled out one of the granola bars, broke off a piece, and offered it out to me. "You first."

Anger surged through my body as I snatched the piece of granola from her hand and shoved it into my mouth. I crunched on the granola bar and swallowed before opening my mouth to show it was gone.

"Happy?"

She shrugged, broke off another piece of granola, and threw it in her mouth. "A bit dry." She said, eventually, but threw another piece of granola into her mouth anyways.

I shrugged. "It's food."

She made a noise of agreement and continued to slowly eat my peace offering, wordlessly I fidgeted in my place, constantly shifting my weight around, and generally _not_ being subtle with how impatient I felt at the moment, allowing ADHD to fuel my movement. My the time she had finished the first granola bar, and I was certain if I had to stand at the doorway for another second without talking, I would burst, she folded up the wrapper around the remaining granola bar, and pocketed it.

"I'm surprised you're back," She said. "the way you left last night rang fairly final, what with you punching the cabin on your way out."

I tried not to cringe. That was far from my finest moment. "I wasn't having a good day."

She quirked an eyebrow at me.

"Unrelated to the snake woman." I said belatedly. I didn't even consider talking about the day I had before getting to the cabin. Chase was, well, _Chase_, and a stranger. Just because I suggested we stick together didn't mean I had forgotten that.

That only seemed to make her more curious, but if she thought much of it, she kept it to herself. "Most don't like being referred to as myths, first of all, that's a good way to make them do anything from attack you to turn you into a pile of ashes, or some sort of animal, depending."

I stared blankly at her.

She looked upwards, and took a deep breath like she was trying to keep _her_ patience. "Monsters, gods, various other, quote unquote, myths."

"Oh." I said, dumbly. After a beat, I gestured to the interior of the cabin. "Can I…?"

Her eyes sharpened and her lips puckered like her words tasted sour to her. "The second you bring up that stupid plan of yours again, I'm kicking your ass out and the door is being barricaded, no matter what monster is nearby."

I shrugged a shoulder. "Fine… but, the offer stands." I added quickly.

She narrowed her eyes, but spun on her heel, and walked back into the cabin with a limp in her step. I followed, closing the door behind me. The morning like filtered into the cabin and gave it a milky glow, making it feel a little less broken down and a little more welcoming, even with torn and overturned furniture littering the room. I noticed a pile of jewelry on the floor, oddly lacking in yellow powder.

"What happened to the snake woman, anyways?" I asked as I followed her into the kitchen and watched as she sat herself down at the table, taking extra care to settle her bad leg in slowly.

"_Dracaenae_." She corrected.

"Yeah, so, what happened to the snake woman, anyways?" I repeated as I sat down at the chair across from her.

I heard her _tsk _harshly. "Are you always this impertinent?"

I waved her off. "It's a feature. So, the snake woman, what happened to her..." I paused, briefly wondering what to call the pile of gold dust her and Definitely-Not-Mrs-Burtshulk left behind. "Remains."

She shook her head, with one of her fingers pressed into her temple like she was getting a headache. "The gold dust eventually scatters, even in closed environments, it's the basis of their physical being, so it has to return to them eventually."

I frowned and furrowed my brow. "Return to them? But she's, like, dead, right?"

She gave me a weary look that almost bordered on sympathetic, but oddly it didn't feel like it was directed at me. "They're not," She sighed, "Monsters can't be destroyed, only killed."

"There's a difference?"

She opened her mouth. "Well-"

I buried my face in my hands. Of freakin' _course _there's a difference.

"- Monsters' essences cannot be destroyed, but their physical form can be killed by either heavy wounds caused by conventional means, or a solid hit with a celestial bronze weapon. When their physical forms die, their essence returns to Tartarus to re-form."

I peaked out from behind my hands. "Tartarus? that's like, Greek hell, right?"

She bit her lip, as she mulled the question over, before answering, "No, the closest thing to what you're probably thinking of is the fields of punishment. Not many cultures have an equivalent to Tartarus, but it's basically the equivalent of hell for monsters. They like it about as much as we would.

I must have made a face, because her stoicism flickered for a second in place of something a little more amused. "Don't piss yourself. Monsters take a while to reform, most need a few years, but it varies depending on how they were killed and how powerful they are. They won't be back for years."

I was about to let out a sigh of relief, when her eyes suddenly go far away, her face grim. "Probably," She adds.

A beat. I swallowed thickly and cleared my throat uncomfortably. "Probably?"

Her hand went up to her mouth distractedly and she bit down on her pointer finger. "That's how it's always worked, at least. I don't know if things are different since…" Her eyes set on mine, like she reminded herself that I was still here, and she still hated me, or whatever. "Since things changed, the system could have as well. It's only been 4 months, and without proper records, there's no real way to tell…" She trailed off, leaving me alone in the cabin as she wrestled with her thoughts.

After a good minute of letting her think, I realized that she'd probably be like that for hours if i didn't remind her I exist. I'm so off her radar, it's almost funny. "But, they're not going to show up, like, right now, right?"

"Don't be ridiculous, that would never happen." She murmured absentmindedly, but I didn't think she really considered it.

I slumped against the table, and propped my head up with my arm, suppressing a weary sigh. _Great conversation. Feeling so reassured about Greek monsters looking to kill me while not being killable themselves._ Instead I just tapped a finger absentmindedly on the table and used the lull as a chance to look around the room.

It was largely the same as it was last night, but now that it was daytime, I could actually see everything, and more than a few things stuck out to me. I could see an aluminum baseball bat propped up against the sink, and went I focused on it, the image of a sword briefly flickered in it's place. I didn't see Chase's knife anywhere, but I got the feeling it was close by.

I had expected that the cabin would have been stripped clean, but I noticed a few odd amenities on the kitchen counter. Oddly there was a big-ass bottle, at least a liter, of concentrated lemon juice sitting on the table next to some papers and what looked like it might have been a pencil, but I wasn't so sure from my vantage point. Aside from that, it was barren, and a little dirty, but it still felt like the old cabin I had come to love. Still felt like home.

My expression darkened as my mind continued to drift, back to that dream I had this morning. It hadn't been the first, and I doubted it would be the last. I'd been having similar dreams of varying intensity ever since everything went to hell. Always about Mom and Paul, always about that day, and always ending with me falling down into something colder and darker than a pit.

My eyes settled back on Chase, still lost in thought, and I couldn't help but wonder if I was remembering right when I thought I had heard her in my dream.

A little motion caught my eye, just the lightest tremor to her posture, and I was suddenly acutely aware that she was tapping her foot in sync with me tapping my finger. I stopped immediately, oddly self-conscious and forcing back heat on my cheeks. I needed a better distraction.

"So how's the leg?" I blurted.

All of her attention fell back onto me with crushing intensity, almost as quickly, her walls built themselves up around her. "Fine." She snapped, "Why?"

I opened my mouth to make a smart retort, but caught myself in the nick of time, closing my mouth and holding her steely glare for a few silent seconds. After the silence was partially audible and painful, I opened my mouth again my voice deadly even. "I was just wondering. Considering how I gave you the means to take care of it-"

"I could have taken care of it." She said with a snort.

"Fine, whatever!" I put my hands up in mock surrender. "I just thought I'd be polite-"

"Polite? You? Ha. Don't you think it's a little late for that? First words you spoke to me were telling me to fuck off."

I blinked. Had it really?. "You really love interrupting me, don't you?"

She fixed me a dry look, but to her credit, stayed quiet.

I scratched the back of my head, feeling a little embarrassed in the silence. So much had happened that everything before the snake woman felt like a blur. Even the time when she stabbed me felt like it was a hazy, years old memory at this point, but somehow I doubted it was the same for her. I don't think she'd forgotten a single word that I'd said, and, if I was honest, that probably gave her the idea that I was an asshole.

My conscious nagged me to remember about the cowgirl comment.

Alright, _top_ asshole. I could almost feel my mom jabbing me in the side and glaring at me like she wanted me to set things right between us, and in this cabin, that thought was too strong to ignore.

"Look," I started, but my voice died in my throat, and my eyes went to my hands. I coughed, and wet my lips before restarting with more force behind my voice, "I said some… things, that were kind of out of line, and, yeah, I had been having a rough day before I met you, and I wanted to just go back to my cabin to spend the night before moving on, but I guess that's no excuse. This place is important to me, I'm sure you already figured that out, and my mom- well, if she was here, she'd _kill me_ if she knew half the shit I've said to you, and, even I know that some of the things I said were pretty uncalled for.

"And even if I was frustrated, that doesn't mean I get a pass, and, this hardly the first time that I've let my anger get the best of me, this one time-" I stopped myself short, realizing I had begun to ramble, and took a deep breath. "I was kind of a jerk. Do you think that maybe we could, I dunno, start fresh?"

Chase, naturally, had crossed her arms at some point and was giving me that analytic look that I was becoming increasingly frustrated by. "No," She said simply, "But the incredibly half-assed apology is noted, even if you didn't actually say 'sorry'."

My face fell to a oddly strong feeling of disappointment that I quickly brushed off, and replaced with a weak, but hopeful smile. "I'm guessing that it's too late to say sorry now?"

"Big time." She said with a nod.

I winced and ducked my chin. "Thought so…" I trailed off into a dull chuckle. Embarrassment was quick to flow into my face, so I swallowed and cleared my throat, eager to drop the conversation. "So, Greek my- Uh, Greek stuff."

"Greek stuff." she repeated.

"You were the one who said they don't like being called myths." I grumbled. "Anyways… you said all the stories were true, right? Like, _all _of them?"

"Not… entirely." She said carefully. "Don't expect every little story to be exact, far too many contradict each-other for anything like that, but generally, there's a basis for most things."

"Alright, but, the big stuff, that's all real, right?"

"Define 'big stuff'."

I swallowed uncomfortably. "The gods. Zeus, and Poseidon, and Aphrodite, all of them."

"Oh. Yeah, they're real." She said flatly. For whatever reason, she almost looked sad when she said it, but I couldn't fathom why.

A sudden rush of energy overtook me. Even if she had kinda mentioned it yesterday, there was something about her actually confirming the gods existed that made the tips of my fingers tingle with nervous electricity. "All of them? Even, all the little, weird ones, like god of spoons or something?"

She shifted uncomfortably in her seat, her eyes kept darting up at the ceiling like it was about to cave in on us. "Yes, and you might want to be a little bit more _respectful_ when talking about them." She said through grit teeth and a hard look.

My eyes drifted up to the ceiling she was studying. Somehow it had evaded me that if the gods were real, then they could probably kill me with a flick of their wrist and a bolt of lightning. I wondered if now that I knew they were real, any sort of disrespect would earn me the appropriate divine punishment. I gulped. "Right, no offense to the gods and all, but what have they been doing all this time? Just… hanging out in Greece?"

"Hardly." She answered like I had just told a bad joke.

I frowned. "But we don't hear about them anymore. Back in the m- stories they were all over the place, talking to humans and-"

"The gods are flexible." She interrupted, "They don't swear by any one particular human culture, they follow the pinnacle of western civilization. Be it Greece, Rome, Britain, or America, it doesn't matter to them."

I cocked my head to the side, confused. "Follow the _what_ of western civilization? Actually, what's western civilization supposed to mean to begin with?"

"Did you ever open an SAT book or do a vocabulary exercise? Pinnacle is like, middle school vocab."

"No," I snapped, "I have dyslexia. Me, books, and words never really got along."

Her mouth opened in a perfect little circle. "Oh." She said quietly, and somehow found the decency to look a little embarrassed.

"Yeah, 'Oh.'"

"Sorry."

I perked up, the bitter aggravation that ground against my gut dispelled by shock. Did Chase just apologize? "What?"

She kept talking like I didn't say a word. "I know it can be frustrating to have it shoved in your face like that." She caught the dumbfounded expression plastered on my face. "The dyslexia. Sometimes, it's easy to forget that normal people can just have it for whatever reason, but I guess it's just as bad for you."

I didn't know, or care what 'normal people' meant, because I was focused on what she just implied. It was a little shocking, she presented so… smart, or at least wordy, I guess, that I never would have guessed she had dyslexia.

"I- thanks. It's alright, just, been a while since anyone brought it up. I'd kinda forgotten about it a bit, honestly."

She stared at me, like she was trying to figure me out, before nodding slightly. "Anyways, simply put, they follow whatever culture best aligns with the the values of western civilization that started in Greece. Whatever culture best exemplifies human ingenuity and creativity and power, the gods will inevitably re-locate there. They've been in America for the past two or three hundred or so years.

"As for how they've gone unnoticed all this time, it's been a combination of the mist, and a change in how subtle they were. They still have an effect on the world around them, powerful ones, but the modern mortal is far less willing to attribute odd happenings to the gods, and the mist can only cover up so much before mortals begin to see through the cracks, even at it's full strength. But they're still doing everything they did in the past, just a little modernized."

It was a lot to wrap my head around. The gods had been in america for every three hundred years? It sounded ridiculous, but everything about Greek myths being real was ridiculous. "What the hell did they do all this time?"

Her lips puckered slightly at my question. "Where you even listening? I said they did everything they used to do. They influenced our society, interacted with us, guided us. The gods can take on any form they wish, so, in theory, you might have even met one."

"Everything, huh?" I whispered to myself, my face twisted in thought, and Annabeth looking at me half expectantly, half curiously. "Didn't the Gods have like, a lot of kids? Like with mortals and stuff?" I asked.

Annabeth immediately tensed up and her eyes widened, her stare nearly tripling in intensity, like a silent threat to drop the subject. But my mind kept turning toward the question, like it was close to the surface of the water and desperate for air. Why would she react like that? She's hiding something, I knew that, but what could she possibly be hiding? She would always clam up if the questions drifted to being about her, and now…

"Wasn't there like, a name for them or...?" my mouth continued to babble out question while my mind tried to work out the problem in front of me. My mind went back to the snake woman. They had mentioned they were looking for… demigods, was it?

"Wasn't it like demigod or something like that? That's what the snake woman called me just before she stabbed me with-"

My eyes widened, and it clicked.

My mouth opened wordlessly and like a floodgate had been opened in my mind, every single puzzle piece rushed perfectly into place. It was a crazy idea, but it fit perfectly with everything I knew.

The snake woman stabbing me with the celestial bronze sword like it would kill me, her calling me a 'demigod', Annabeth stabbing me with her her knife, even if I wasn't a monster. The very same blades that she said was for specifically dealing with myths. Annabeth never once used the word human when explaining how the mist worked, or how celestial bronze worked, she had always said 'mortal', like she wasn't. She asked me what I had seen her knife as, like she didn't see it as anything but a knife, her saying that all this Greek monster bullshit had been her life since she was _born_. I felt like an idiot for not putting it together sooner.

Her expression told the whole story, even though I hadn't even said anything yet. But she knew I knew. Her face was an unreadable, yet intense mask that confirmed my thoughts before her voice could ever had the chance.

My mouth suddenly felt dry, but I spoke clearly.

"Annabeth, are you a demigod?"

* * *

**_AN: Shoot for two weeks get a month. Eh. I spent a decent amount of that time setting things up for later events in the story (including wresting a certain rhyming couplet for a damn near week, if you catch my drift so I don't feel like I've wasted time at least. Also, I went back and did some editing and stuff to previous chapters, mostly the prologue and chapter 1, since they had some really standout errors that I needed to fix. I also made a significant change to the final line of the prologue, and I highly advise you go check it out if you've already the the prologue. I'm certain that a few of you will raise an eyebrow at the change, but rest assured, the endgame of this fic has not changed, only the amount of transparency I am willing to give has changed. those of you who got excited when they read that line will not be dissapointed. I will thank all of you who have read the fic prior to his chapter to be discrete about that factoid, as I'm certain future readers wouldn't like that to be spoiled._**

**_Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I'm quite happy with it. I had to wrestle with the thing a big because I was having issues with scene flow progression, but i think i managed to cobble it together nicely. I hope Percy's realization doesn't come off as contrived, it was done in part because I realized that I probably shouldn't have 10+ 5k word chapters on them talking in a cabin nonstop, so I moved up the demigod question a bit._**

**_I hope you all have a nice day!_**


	6. Names We Shouldn't Say

Annabeth crossed her arms slowly. The cabin was so still I could practically hear her skin as it brushed against her clothes.

This conversation had reached a closed door.

It's not like I didn't know the answer. There's no way she would have gotten this defensive and silent unless the answer was a yes. I was sitting across from the child of a god.

Frankly, that was at least twice as scary as the snake women. I wondered if she could smite me. She probably couldn't, or she would have probably done it by now and I would be a smear on the ground, but I still figured that it might be in my best interest to make myself seem less smite-able.

"I agreed to explain the world that you had been blissfully ignorant to until yesterday. Not myself." Annabeth said, dangerously calm. Despite that, I could sense a hint of resentment in her tone, originating from who knows where.

"The two seem a bit related to me." I said dryly.

"I'm sorry," She said, though she _definitely_ didn't sound sorry. "but you seem a bit confused as to who's controlling this conversation." She stood up in her seat, leaning over the table, and splaying her hands across it's surface, her whole demeanor suddenly looked eerily similar to a big cat about the pounce.

"It's me. The one who actually knows anything about everything in this room. You don't get to decide what we talk about, I do. Who I am is not relevant to the information that you're looking for, and it won't be a subject of discussion." She leaned further down over the table, her eyes swirling like storm clouds right before a blizzard. "Is that understood?"

I met her glare with something that I'd like to think was a look of equal force. The way she was talking- condescending and oh-so 'in control', it instantly made me pinpoint what it is that I hated about her. She was just like the scores of teachers I'd run through in the past, from the public to private schools, from all grades and all walks of life, that all determined I was a delinquent from the moment they laid eyes on me. They all looked at me the same way that Annabeth was looking at me right now, like I was some long gone, lost cause that should feel grateful for them even speaking to me, let alone trying to explain anything to me. Hell, she even called me impertinent, the only reason I knew what that word meant was because of the countless teachers that had used it to describe me. I clenched my fist over and over to try to simmer myself down a little. It was not a very effective outlet.

"I don't see the problem."

"You wouldn't."

"Yeah, because you never explain anything to me!" I snapped. "Do you expect me to read your goddamn mind and know what I can and cannot say around you? I feel like I'm walking through a minefield every time I open my mouth."

"Well then _maybe_, you shouldn't open your mouth!" She shot back.

"Like hell I will! What's the big deal anyways?"

"It's none of your-" She started to say, but it was my time to interrupt her.

"So what if you're a demigod? Who gives a fuck? It's not like I'm going to be running around blabbing about how I met this one random girl who was the child of a god. People would think I've lost it and try to put me out of my misery! So what if you're wrapped up in all this greek stuff? Isn't everyone?"

She let out a sharp breath of laughter. "Gods, you have no idea what you're talking about."

"Because you aren't _telling me anything_." I grit out, running my hands through my hair in frustration.

"Oh, go to hell," She spat. " I've held your hand through this conversation for two days now and you're still bitching and moaning like a baby throwing a tantrum."

"Because you're not answering half of my fucking questions." I snarled back.

"And what, exactly, makes you think I want to? In case you haven't realized, I'm still not taking you up on that ridiculous offer for partnership, so it's not like I'm going to be all buddy-buddy best friends forever with you. As soon as I'm fully mobile, I'm out of this stupid cabi-"

I flew out of my seat and slammed my fists down on the table, cutting her off entirely, and leaving the cabin silent, except for the sound of my own heavy breathing. Anger flared and swirled in my lungs, so much so that it actually felt like my breath had become heated, and the feeling was only multiplied as her cold, grey eyes stared back at me, unflinching.

However, it was short lived. Anger was quick to be pushed over to the side in place of a solid rock of shame that nested in my gut and pumped cement into my veins. I had just pulled a Gabe. I pulled a Gabe in me and my mom's cabin.

A quick word on Gabe Ugliano: He was the first husband of my mom, as much as I wish as I could deny that. He seemed like a decent enough guy at first, but as soon as the honeymoon was over, he dropped that act hard and fast. When I was young, I would call him 'Smelly Gabe', because he reeked about as much fresh out of the shower (not that he showered) as everyone did nowadays; four months without a single shower with essence of corpse cologne. the only thing worse than his smell was how he acted. An alcoholic with anger issues never really screamed 'daddy material', but he made up for that by screaming about everything else.

My mom married him for his money, not his charmingly repulsive personality. Normally, that would make her an awful person, but Gabe was not normal by any means; he was extraordinarily terrible, which made my mom extraordinarily selfless. I won't go into how bad of a situation we were in before she married Gabe, but there were nights I went to bed hungry, which meant there were probably a lot of nights she went to bed hungry. Gabe was the best option in a terrible situation, as much as I hated to admit it.

When he wasn't drunk, he was usually screaming, and when he was drunk, he was still screaming, but he also tended to forget what he was screaming about a lot of the time, so it wasn't a huge issue. He was a very 'my way or the highway' sort of guy, and the highway in his book meant shouting, making threats, and while I had never seen it personally, I was sure he hit my mom. I was away at different boarding schools more often than not during the school year, so I had never seen it, but sometimes he would do something, like, oh, slam the table for instance, and my mom would flinch. It's not difficult to put two and two together.

He's long gone now. He was killed in a terrible, ah, 'accident' involving a cement mixer, and the usual dose of alcohol in his system. He was not missed, especially not with the substantial life insurance payout he gave us.

But being dead didn't necessarily mean he was really _gone_. Even years after he died, his presence could still be felt. When my mom had first started dating Paul, I was constantly second guessing him and his intentions. It took me a long time to finally accept the fact that Paul wasn't Gabe, and never would be. It was stupid, I know, but-don't tell anyone- the thought of another Gabe marrying my mom scared me shitless.

But that wasn't the worst of it.

On rare instances, when I was furious, I could swear I heard his voice in the back of my mind, like he was standing right behind me, shooting his usual jeers until my vision was tinted red and I just _had_ to hit something. It was like an infection, and every time I got angry, I could feel it fester and spread.

I felt like I was going to be sick. It wasn't the first time I had done something like this, like Gabe, but it was the first time it happened in the cabin. It was worse than a punch to the gut.

Slowly, I lowered myself back into my chair and swallowed the bile that was rapidly collecting in my throat. "I already told you," I said, my voice rough, "this cabin _isn't_ stupid."

Annabeth leaned back and crossed her arms. She looked almost… disappointed, which didn't help the fact that I felt like burying myself in the sand and waiting for a riptide to pull me to the bottom of the ocean.

"You know, considering the amount of hang-ups you have about a freaking building, I'd think that you'd be a little more understanding of me not wanting to recite my sob stories for your entertainment." She said in a clipped tone.

"Entertainment." I repeated, deadpan. "You think I want to know more about you for my entertainment."

"Well then, what is your goal, exactly? I already told you, it's not relevant."

I squinted at her. "You want me to give you a reason? For what, wanting to know more about you?"

She gave me a sharp nod, her features rock solid with stoicism. "Precisely that,"

A humorless laugh pushed through my mouth and I slumped back in my seat. "Gee, I dunno, it couldn't be that I'm just try to get to know you. That'd be crazy, right?"

She lowered her face down, until she was practically glaring at me through her eyebrows. "Don't bullshit me, Jackson. You've got a reason, or you wouldn't be pressing about me, or trying to force yourself into my company."

" 'Just said it." I sighed irritably slumped back a little further in the chair, feeling caught between petulant and still a bit queasy.

"That doesn't count."

"Well, why not?"

"Because, in case you didn't notice, the two of us don't really fit, you know?" Her eyes flashed, and her mouth twisted to the right like she was trying to hold back a snarl. "Since the moment we first started interacting, we've been at each other's throats-"

"Pretty sure you started that." I injected dryly, but she continued like I hadn't even opened my mouth.

"and the only time we managed to go five minutes without one of us biting the other's head off was when we were fighting the _dracaenae_, and I think it's safe to say that there were other priorities at the time. You're constantly trying to get me to relay information about my life to you on top of me having to spoonfeed you on basic greek fundamentals, an offer I regret immensely by the way, and when you're not doing either of those things, you're either suggesting ridiculous partnerships, or flipping your lid over a cabin. You want to talk about me being a minefield? Rich, coming from the guy who loses his cool over a cabin. As I've already said, I'm gone in a few days time, and then there's a damn good chance we'll never so much as hear about the other ever again. So why, exactly, would you want to know more about someone that you _clearly_ don't like, and will be, at most, be spending a few days with, or however long it takes for you to grate on my nerves hard enough for me to kick you out, and lock the door on your sorry ass, other than sick kicks?"

She huffed angrily as she finished, leaving me feeling gobsmacked by the sudden angry rant. I didn't want to admit it, but she wasn't wrong. Both of us had not exactly been nice to each-other, for a variety of reasons. In our short time together, we managed to butt heads on pretty much every topic we've covered.

If it wasn't for the snake women attacking us, I would have never given her the time of day, and she probably would have cleared out yesterday if she had a real choice in the matter, but that wasn't the hand life dealt us. But, for the moment, we were just kind of stuck together. She had the answers, and I had questions,

Even still, I had to wonder, if the situation was different, would we really be so opposed to the other? I could hardly deny she was attractive, when she wasn't busy frowning and scowling at least. Annabeth had a weird way about her that made me want to straighten up and prove myself just as capable as she was. Did I have some sort of effect on her? I didn't know exactly what she thought of me, but, I couldn't help but let my mind wander a little, ADHD's like that.

I blinked, snapping myself from my reverie. I don't know how long I had been thinking silently, but Annabeth was still looking at me half-expectant.

"Well?" She breathed at me.

I felt like a total deer in the headlights. So I did what I always do when I'm faced with oncoming death: Open my big mouth.

"Maybe..." I rolled the words around my mouth, trying spit them out, but failing pretty hard. There's a choking sensation in my adam's apple that is all too familiar, and it threatened to crush my windpipe with how oppressive it is. The feeling it only tightened as the words pressed closer to my lips. It was like choking, but worse.

But I've felt a hell of a lot worse than that feeling. I'd been feeling a lot worse than that feeling. It's an age-old uncertainty and it definitely would have left me gasping helplessly at empty words that wouldn't come in the past. But, this was now, and after all this time, I had come to realize that sometimes the regret isn't worth trying to spare my comfort.

"Maybe," I repeated, with more strength, "we don't have to not fit."

Her brow furrowed, like she was lost with a map, but one written in an alien language. It made her look oddly disarmed, and gave me just enough reason to press on.

"Just because we don't get along, doesn't mean we have to stay that way." I looked down at my ratty pants, and started picking at the seams absentmindedly to try to hide the heat on my face. "We can be civil to each other. We've both apologized to each other for things, so it's not like we're totally unable to be decent around each-other."

"You didn't actually say you were sorry."

"You were the one who called it an apology, not me." I said with a raised eyebrow.

She grunted in assent, but didn't sound too happy about it.

"And, for the record, I am. Sorry, I mean. For before, and for now. I've never been good with my temper."

She ignored my apology, and started to tap her finger on the table impatiently as she stared me down. "So, what, you're under the delusion that, somehow, if I tell you my life story, we'll magically become friends?"

I rolled my eyes. I wasn't sure if she honestly thought I was that stupid, or if she was just being sarcastic. "No, I just- I think we should try. That's it."

"Do you now?" She said as she tilted her head back,and looked down at me through her nose. "Why the sudden change of heart? Do I need to remind you that last night you were all closed doors and secrets, too? What was it that you said? 'Maybe I'll tell you if you become my survival buddie'?" She mocked in venomous falsetto, which was weird since my voice was deeper than hers.

"I didn't want to." I blurted on impulse, long before my filter realized words were going to my mouth. Her bewildered look made me realize that, once again, I was not being clear.

"About what you said last night, about how you'd think I would have joined a survival group. I didn't want to join any group, or be around anybody in general. I…" I opened my mouth and closed it again, losing my already loose grip on the words that were coming from my mouth. I hadn't ever tried to talk to anyone about this before, what the hell was I thinking?

Oh, right, I wasn't. I let the word vomit flow.

"My mom, she uh," I wet my lips and swallowed the stone in my throat. "she died. Really, really early into all of this. My stepdad too. All I wanted to be left alone, and by the time I stopped wanting the whole world to just leave me alone, almost everyone had already cleared out of the city. No more groups to join, really, that's all there really was to it."

I rubbed the nape of my neck roughly, looking down as I started to feel the buzzing tiptoe of embarrassment beginning to sink into me. Was it weird that I suddenly just brought it up again? She probably thought I was a baby now, or something. I silently cursed myself for just talking like that.

"Was she killed?"

I looked back up to see Annabeth staring back at me, her expression cautious, but I could see the barest twinkle of dull curiosity in her eyes. I had to wonder if she was only asking that because the silent treatment would be cold even in her book, or some other reason. I had to wonder if she lost one of her parents in the apocalypse too… well, the one that wasn't a god, anyways.

I shrugged a shoulder and looked away again. "Yeah. They both were." A beat. "Is your family…?"

I could feel her stiffen in her seat. "That's none of-" she started, but caught herself, and my eyes went back to her. She looked like she was wrestling with something internally for a second, but we made eye contact and she shook her head. "It's a complicated situation."

"My dad ditched and I've had two stepdads." I said, my tone just cold enough that it would probably give a social worker heartburn. "I can get complicated. Unless you're talking about the non-human side of your family."

She sent me a cutting look, but it looked like it was out of annoyance more than anger. I could see her mind whirling like it was a machine behind her tempered glare, like she was hastily weighing options and calculating outcomes. Her face cleared and she shot me another warning look before she spoke again.

"The truth is, I have no idea how my family is doing, but…" She bit her lip, "at this point, I doubt they're alive. Who knows. Maybe my dad managed to think up some sort of plan, but keeping everyone safe, that's… difficult." For maybe about a solid second, I could see guilt peeking through her eyes. I had to wonder what, exactly, brought her all the way up this far north, and why she was traveling alone, but those questions could wait.

"Well… I survived," I offered hopefully, "and I didn't even know about the Greek stuff until now, and I'd imagine your dad knows all about it like you, right?"

She gave me an odd look. "He's a mortal who can see through the mist."

I blinked in surprise. "He can do that?"

"Quite a few mortals can, actually. No one really knows why, because it's not hereditary, or have anything to do with experiences. Some are just born unlucky."

"Alright… well, then if I survived, he'd probably have no trouble, as long as he avoided rioters."

"That's a nice thought," She mumbled to herself absentmindedly.

I frowned, unable to shake the impression that there was more on her mind than just whether or not her family was okay. I briefly wondered if I should press the subject, but I figured that I shouldn't test my luck. As… difficult as it may be, I knew I was going to have to share things first if I wanted any chance of her responding to my questions about her. I decided a change in subject was needed.

"I think my mom would have liked you- so long as she didn't know you tried to stab me, then she'd probably have second thoughts." I said as i leaned back in the chair until I was teetering precariously on two legs, trying to keep my posture as light as my voice "You're, well, I dunno, you did ultimately save my life, so she'd definitely like you for that, but, it's more about you. You have this no bullshit attitude that I think she would respect."

I could see her fidget slightly in her seat, her lips turning up just slightly, which made her look wholly smug, but it turned back down pretty fast."Were the two of you… close?"

"She was my mom. Until she married my first stepdad, it was just the two of us. Hard not to be, especially when it's her."

"What was she like?"

"The best," I sighed, "I can count the number of times she was actually mad at anyone on one hand, but, at the same time, she wasn't a pushover, either. She just had her own way of doing things, kinda rebellious, but like, in a quiet sort of way. More like defiant, I guess. She wouldn't let anyone or anything get to her, she could soldier through anything like it didn't even bother her"

I twined my fingers together, squeezing at them and interlocking them over and over as my eyes dropped down to my lap. "She did too. I didn't exactly make things simple for her, since I wasn't exactly what you'd call a 'model student' by any means, but she never complained about it. She worked hard to support me-had to quit college too. She had such a hard life, even before she had me, but you'd never know if you met her. She was always smiling. She deserved a hell of a lot better than what she ended up with in life."

By the time I was finished talking, my fingers were tangled in knots and my throat felt thick. I wasn't all teary-eyed just yet, but I knew that it wouldn't take much for that to happen at this point, which was pretty embarrassing.

"It must have been tough, losing her." I heard her say, making me realize I had gone silent. When I looked up to face her, her expression was oddly neutral. "I'd say I'm sorry, but I know firsthand how pathetically empty that sounds, but I can sympathize, if that's any consolation."

"Ha, not really," I chuckled lightly and shook my head. "that's actually just kinda depressing, Annabeth."

She frowned, and grumbled, "Well, I guess that's why they always had Malcolm be the grief counselor."

"Malcolm?"

She looked surprised, like she hadn't expected me to hear her or something. She shimmied in her seat, like she was having a rapid-fire debate with herself before her eyes turned back to mine. "A brother."

"Oh… did he…?"

"Die? No, not since I last saw him." she said, her voice confident, but she gnawed on a fingernail slightly before she spoke. "He's smart and resourceful. It'll take a little more than the collapse of western civilization or a couple of monsters to take him out."

"Wait," I furrowed my brow. "I thought you said you doubted your family was-"

She cut me off, "Malcolm is my half brother, he's never so much as met my dad."

My my mouth fell open just a little. "Wait, do you mean he's a…?" I gestured for her to continue.

Her jaw set, and I was sure that she was going to give me the silent treatment again, but she heaved out a heavy sigh and gave me a somewhat defeated look. "Yeah, maternal half-siblings."

"So then the two of you have the same mom, right?"

"That's what maternal means," she muttered under her breath.

"Annabeth, you know what I mean." I said, starting to feel the frustration tinge my words after dancing around the topic for so long.

"That doesn't mean I have to answer your implied question." She said dryly, her eyes wandering the room, like she was looking for some sort of escape route that wouldn't make her leg an issue.

"Why? Annabeth, look," I made a hopelessly vague gesture with my hands, and froze halfway, leaving them hanging in front of me, which probably made me look like an idiot. "I _know_ you're a demigod. You've told me your dad is a regular…-ish guy, so that really only leaves one thing for your mom to be. I already told you, I'm not going to go and just tell anyone about you, so you don't have to worry about your secret, so what's the issue?"

"Percy, we've talked for a grand total of two hours," She stated it like it was a fact, which, well, it kind of was. "and I'm not exactly vying for someone to vent to about my problems, especially not when it's someone I barely know."

"Then think of me as unbiased," I snapped irritably,and we traded glares. I sighed, breaking eye contact first and running a hand down my face. _No fighting, _I reminded myself, _not after I finally started talking to her properly. _More diplomatically, I spoke, "Look, I'm not going to screw you over, or anything. I said we should take a crack at being something other than at each-other's throats, right?"

She shook her head. "That doesn't mean I'm going to tell you everything about me. Most friends don't even do that, so can we just drop it?"

I opened my mouth to argue, but just before the words made it out of my mouth caught a tired look on her eyes, and the words fizzled into nothing. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, to steady my thoughts.

The goal: Don't be an asshole. If I can remember how to actually be nice, then act that way.

"Alright, fine, you win." I held up my hands in surrender.

Her mouth may have dropped just a little, and that reaction may just have been worth it. Seeing Annabeth caught off guard was actually pretty gratifying, especially since I was the cause.

I rolled my eyes at her. "You don't have to act so surprised."

That seemed to snap her out of it. Her grey eyes glinted with curiosity, which made me wonder if she was trying to figure out if I was trying to get something out of her with the move. I can't really blame her for thinking like that, for all my talk about trying to actually be decent people to each-other, it was still just talk.

"I just thought you'd put up more resistance, after all that talk about being determined yesterday."

"I told you, I'm not _that_ determined, just more determined than most looters." I said with a shrug.

She hummed, her expression still skeptical, but it was slowly becoming a little more smug. "I guess so."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"Don't be ridiculous." She teased.

Whatever," I grumbled, "where were we anyways?"

She slumped over the table with a small sigh, and propped her head up with her hand. "I don't know. I think I was explaining the fluid nature of the gods before you started talking about half-bloods."

"Half-bloods? You mean-"

She held up a hand to quiet me. "Same thing. Just safer."

I gave her a confused look, "What?"

She grunted, straightening her posture up a little. "Words are powerful. When you speak them, you invoke the presence of whatever it is you're talking about. When it comes to being a half-blood, saying the proper term for half-blood has a quality of being an open invitation for every malevolent supernatural entity within ten square miles rushing to your door looking for the chance to disembowel you."

I nodded slowly at that pleasant thought, as my blood slowly turned to ice as I counted up the times I said demigod in the past few minutes. I think it was four. Four public invitations to disembowel me. I'm gonna sleep well tonight.

I must have looked pretty freaked out, because Annabeth's brow furrowed at me and she gave me what she probably thought was a reassuring smile. "Don't worry about you saying it. You're mortal. A lot of monsters don't view you as important enough to listen in on, so you have some leeway where I don't." A beat, "you should still probably stick to half-blood from now on as a precaution."

I shot her a dirty look, and she held up her hands innocently. "Didn't you use the name of those snake woman earlier?"

She frowned, like she wanted to correct me on the whole snake woman vs. dracowhatevers, but instead she just waved me off. "Nonspecific terms. The more unique a name is to a concept, the more dangerous it is to say it. There are thousands of 'snake woman', it's more like a species name than anything, so unless one was actually close, it's fairly safe to say it."

"You didn't say it just now."

"Precaution."

I mouthed 'right' down at the table, shaking my head slightly. I'd honestly bet she was too wrapped up in trying to correct me earlier to remember the chance of summoning more scimitar swinging maniac snake women while she was injured and I was still pretty sore myself.

"You sound like you have a lot of experience with monsters."

"Whole life, remember?"

"Yeah, but," I tapped a finger loudly on the table. "You can see them, right? Couldn't you just avoid them?"

She laughed humorlessly and a tired look took over her face again. "If it was that easy, I wouldn't be in this mess. No, monsters seek out half-bloods to try to kill them from an early age, because half-bloods are the most capable of fighting back against monsters. Better to go after your predator while it's still your prey, right?"

"What?" For a second, the sickness I felt from earlier was renewed. She said it so casually, like monsters attack her was almost a joke to her. It seemed wrong. "Annabeth, that's…"

"Life?" She completed sardonically.

"I was gonna say awful." It was no wonder she had that tired look about her. I'd only had one encounter with a monster and I already wished I never had to see a snake woman or any other evil Greek demons ever again. The thought of them chasing me around my entire life, it sounded exhausting at best and more likely fatal.

She shook her head at me, her ponytail swaying urgently as she did. I stared a bit. "It's survival, Percy. It's what everyone is doing nowadays, but unlike everyone, I've been preparing for this for years. In a way, I guess I can be thankful."

I pursed my lips, unable to find a response to that. She certainly had a point. Annabeth was like a spring-loaded machine, toned and ready for action at the drop of the hat. Before the end of the world, while I wasn't really out of shape, I was certainly a lot more fit now, if a little bit skinnier than was really needed. I had to learn a lot about fighting from bad experiences of being on the wrong end of a knife more than once. If someone tried to jump Annabeth in an alley, I would fear for what Annabeth would do to them more than I would fear for her safety. But still, was that preparedness worth a life of being chased by monsters?

"Pensive isn't your best look."

I startled. Annabeth was staring at me, just the slightest bit amused.

"I was just thinking."

"That's what pensive means."

"Thank you, Miss SAT vocabulary." I scoffed.

She raised an eyebrow at me, and tapped her foot, like she was waiting for me to continue.

"Do you ever wish you had been born… I dunno, normal?"

The question seemed to surprise her, but more so that it was coming from me than the question itself. Still, it seemed to throw her off enough for her to start shifting her weight around in her chair. She folded her arms tightly, almost like she was trying to give herself a huge but forgot how to do it properly.

"It would have been easier, definitely," She said slowly, "but I can't confidently say I would rather have been mortal. My life would be far too different. Hell, I'd be too different." She adopted a faraway look, like she was thinking about someone else entirely when she said that. I figured that I should probably leave it at that.

"Alright," I breathed, "Sorry for hounding you about the half-blood stuff."

"It's fine."

Annabeth didn't look like she wanted to talk anymore. I kind of felt bad, to be honest, even if she did offer to explain everything to me, having to explain things for so long to someone who barely understood must have been tiring. On top of that, she was injured. The air was rapidly becoming as awkward as the silence, and I shuffled my feet against the floor for a few minutes before eventually deciding that the whole atmosphere was probably shot for the day. Annabeth looked like she was borderline catatonic with how unfocused her gaze was, and I was probably going to explode if I didn't stop sitting down soon.

"Look, if you want, I can-" I started to say, but was cut off from a sound coming from outside.

It sounded like the engine of a monster truck revving to life after years of disuse combined with nails on a chalkboard somewhere in the background. It sent chills down my spine, made my breath hitch, and tied an anchor of dread to my stomach. I gave Annabeth a panicked look, and found her reaction was similar. She was stiff as a board.

"Oh gods," she whispered so quietly I could barely hear her voice under her breath. "that couldn't have-"

She was silence by another growl, this time, somehow, deeper and more angry-sounding than the last.

I felt like I had been frozen to my chair, and my lungs had fallen out of my chest. Annabeth gave me a warning look, as if to say 'don't make a sound.'.

I gulped, and sucked in a haggard breath as quietly as I could. I nodded my head toward the wall and mouthed to her, 'monster?'.

Her eyes darted from side to side, before she nodded and mouthed back a 'Yes.'.

As if on cue, the monster growled again.

* * *

**_AN: Uh-oh, spaghettios. These two can't catch a break. _**

**_Three weeks and 2 days. Improvement. not two weeks, but an improvement. Hopefully once school dies down I'll be able to actually follow my schedule. _****_Also, I'm currently looking for a beta-reader! If you're interested in Beta-ing this story (or any of my pjo-related filth) don't hesitate to shoot me a PM._**

**_I hope you enjoyed the chapter, and have a wonderful day._**


	7. Sympathy for the Chewtoys

Two snake woman in one day? Alright, considering one went down without a fight, we can chalk that up to poor luck.

But, two snake woman in the evening, and then the growling hellbeast the following day? I was beginning to think that the Greek monsters were holding my previous lack of belief in them against me.

Neither me or Annabeth dared to move a muscle. Whatever the hell was outside the cabin was still growling as it wandered around the perimeter of the cabin. Part of me hoped that if we stayed quiet enough, it would just go away, but the way Annabeth's eyes were frantically darting around like an escape hatch would suddenly appear from thin air.

My eyes wander over to the baseball bat propped up against the sink, and the image of a sword briefly replaces it. If I could just…

My attention is torn from the sword by Annabeth giving me a frantic wave and a pointed look. Once my eyes were on her she mouthed a 'no' that I'm sure would have sounded pretty harsh if she could talk right now.

I grimace at her and gesture toward the sword desperately widening my eyes meaningfully at her. I failed to see why that would be a bad idea. I know I would feel a whole lot safer if I had a sword to stick between me and whatever the hell is out there.

But she just shook her head vigorously at me, and pointed down at the table several times before sinking down in her chair and silently slipping under the table. I had to resist a powerful urge to roll my eyes and huff as I slid under the table to join her.

My joints popped as I twisted myself to avoid scraping the chair against the floor, each one sending little waves of electric worry up my spine. It was highly unlikely that whatever was out there could hear my joints cracking from outside the cabin, but if you tried to tell my brain that, he'd ignore you. With some difficulty I managed to get myself under the table with only the barest hint of a scrape from the chair.

Annabeth was crouched down low, creeping towards me slowly, but her eyes still shifting. I met her halfway, out faces only inches apart.

"What's out there?" I whispered to her as quietly as I could manage.

I saw her swallow, and then shook her head. "Nothing friendly," she whispered back, though she honestly sounded more exasperated than rightfully terrified. "but I have a hunch. Stay low and as silent as possible. If we're lucky, it might leave."

"And if we're unlucky?"

She pulled her dagger out and locked eyes with me. "You run."

"What?!" I whispered a little too harshly, and I heard the monster growl outside again, this time, it scraped something that sounded sharp and heavy on the cabin walls.

The two us of flinched at the sound. I had expected to hear another growl or another scrape, but instead I heard something big bound around the cabin in a few leaps. I breathed a small sigh of relief before turning back to Annabeth.

"Annabeth," I whispered, my voice just short of silent again, "I'm not just gonna leave you here!"

Her free hand shot out and grabbed my wrist tightly, her expression grim. "Percy, this is not a discussion. Whatever is out there is going to go for me first. I can hold it off while you-"

"You're _injured_!"

"I'm _trained_."

I grit my teeth and wrenched my hand away from her grasp, only to place it on her shoulder with a grip to match hers. "There's no way in _hell_ I'm leaving you here to die." I stressed, "That's-"

I was interrupted by a bark as loud as a car alarm, and another harsh scrape, stronger this time, enough to make the entire cabin tremor. Whatever was out there, it as big, strong, and sharp. The both of us remained frozen until once again the sound of to monster moving could be heard.

"Percy," Annabeth hissed, "You will only get yourself hurt or worse if you try to fight that thing. Please, just make a break for it. I'll be _fine_."

Her face was filled with an unshakable determination that made of of her previous stony glares look like they were made from damp sand. There was a new level of intensity in her stare that I wasn't able to place until I noticed the slight tremble of her hand.

She was afraid.

Be it for herself(which was likely), or for me(which was unlikely), she was afraid right now. That's exactly why I couldn't leave her.

I had let plenty of people die for the sake of my own survival in the past four months. Hell, that guy getting chased yesterday was probably dead by now as well. I felt bad about it, on some level, but if I went back, I don't think I would honestly make a different choice. I wasn't a hero, and even if I did try to help, I probably would have just gotten myself killed along with them.

But I didn't know those people.

Sure, maybe I had only known Annabeth a few hours, and maybe for most of those hours, we had been arguing, but I still _knew_ her. Her fear felt real, and personal, and relevant. I felt it alongside her, and the thought of abandoning her to face that fear alone was sickening.

There was another loud scrape, this time with even more force, enough to make the two of us jump a little. Along with it came a sickening crack that echoed through the cabin, and it quivered like the last leaf on a tree. Just as the rumbling began to die down, in the corner of my eye, I saw something move. I caught the look of horror on Annabeth face as she found our downfall:

The baseball bat that was propped up against the sink was falling down.

It hit the ground with an overwhelming clamor that I dully realized didn't sound like a baseball bat hitting the ground at all, but rather the sword it really was. After it finally settled, there was an eerie stillness in the air and outside.

Then, a furious pounding against the sand rang through the air and shook the cabin, as if something that sounded like it was about the weight of a minivan was bounding towards us.

I turned back to Annabeth and I didn't even bother to whisper, "I'm staying this time."

Before she could respond, I darted out from underneath the table, and scooped up the bat. It flickered into its proper form for a second.

"You're a stubborn dipshit."

I looked over to see Annabeth standing on the other side of the table, looking particularly cross with me, but her posture was facing the direction of the running sound at all times.

I tried to adjust my stance so that it more or less mirrored Annabeth's. I was pretty sure I was doing it wrong somehow, but it certainly made me feel like I wasn't being totally suicidal right now, even if I was shaking. The pounding of the monster on the sand was closer now, which did not serve to quell the terror in my stomach.

"It's a feature." I said, as I shot her a shaky smile.

The sound of the monster running was practically at the kitchen door by now. I really felt like I should be praying to some god right now, Greek or otherwise.

"Get back!" Annabeth ordered, and I took a few quick steps back from the sink as the monster approach the outside of the kitchen.

Barely a moment passed before the window above the sink shattered. Glass shards showered over where I had just been standing, and the whole house groaned in response to the attempted entry. I'd have to remember to thank Annabeth for the warning sometime later, provided we lived that long.

A black Tibetan Mastiff that was barking about as loud as a plane engine had its head (which was about the size of a car tire) caught in the window. If it weren't for the glowing red eyes, I would have thought it was just a normal, albeit nasty and enormous dog.

That is, until it reached a paw into the window and ripped the faucet clean off of the sink as it tried to scramble into the cabin. I could even see the corner of the window starting to buckle where it was trying to shoulder through the far too small hole.

"What on earth is that thing?!" I shouted over the pooch as it barked and scrambled over the sink, and subsequently was in the process of turning it into a pile of scrap metal.

"Nothing friendly. Aim for the torso or the head if you want a clean kill… and widen your stance, are you trying to get yourself disemboweled?"

I nodded and shuffled my legs a little further apart, resuming my stare down with the dog as it lashed around. I wasn't sure if I should approach it. Annabeth wasn't going to be getting anywhere near it while it was flailing around like that when she has a dagger as a weapon. But the sword in my hands was as big as… well, a baseball bat. Surely I could stab at it from a safe range, right?

I took a tentative step forward, and the dog suddenly stilled and stared straight at me. Its gleaming red eyes glaring at me like hot coals that actually felt like they were going to bore a hole into me, and a low growl rumbled from its throat. My legs felt like they had been replaced with cement, but I shuffled forward another step.

The hound was having none of that, and promptly pulled itself out of the window with little fuss.

I furrowed my brow. Did I spook it somehow? Did it just realize that it wasn't going to be able to get in and give up? No one's that lucky, which means I'm _definitely_ not that lucky.

"Don't let your guard down." Annabeth's stern voice pulled me from my thoughts. "It's unlikely you managed to intimidate it."

"Thanks for the confidence boost." I muttered, taking a few steps back to where I started, my eyes still trained on the window. But… nothing happened.

The dog didn't bark or growl. It didn't leap around the cabin looking for a better entrance, and it didn't so much as poke it's head back up through the window. Far from a relief, it was actually making me more jittery. Eventually, the silence got to me.

"Ever fight one of these before?" I asked with a nod in Annabeth's direction, while my eyes remained peeled on the window.

"A few," She said slowly. I got the feeling that she was sharing in my discomfort.

"Do they usually do this?"

I saw her shift slightly from the corner of my eye, like she was nervous. I determined this was a bad sign.

"Just stay on guard."

I nodded slowly, and adjusted my hold on the sword, holding it up a little higher. I suddenly wished I had given myself a haircut this morning when I trimmed down my scruff, so my hair wouldn't be trying to fall into my face.

Seconds of silence slowly stretched into a minute. With each second, the monster's presence became more and more of a choking uncertainty. Even Annabeth was starting to look a little jittery. A chill ran up my spine, unbidden, sending waves of goosebumps over my skin.

It took me two seconds to realize that the chill that was licking at my backside, wasn't nerves. The temperature of the air had suddenly dropped a good twenty degrees. The floorboards behind me creaked with sudden weight, and froze my blood in my veins. I whipped around to find the monster's red eyes gleaming in the shadowy corner of the living room.

It took a step forward. Well, actually, it was more like it was _pulling_ itself out of the shadowy corner, and the shadows were clinging to it's fur, an odd black on darker black.

"Percy!" Annabeth shouted.

"How the _fuck_-" I started to say, but was rudely interrupted by the monster lunging at me.

I panicked. Completely ignoring the sword in my hands, I jumped to the chair nearest to me, and sprung off in Annabeth's direction, just in time to feel the monster pass by my backside. The chair slid out from under me and I gracelessly landed on top of the sword, which would have been a real problem if the sword wasn't magic, since I could kinda tell it was sticking through my torso again.

I heard the monster crash into the counter, as well as the sound of the chair I dislodged cracking under the weight of the monster. Fueled by an overwhelming surge of adrenaline, I rolled back over, even in my slightly stunned state, just in time to see the monstrous dog leap at me again, teeth bared.

Annabeth, however, was faster, and a hell of a lot more terrifying in that moment.

She tackled the monster as it was mid-lunge and drove her dagger into it's mouth. The monster let out an incredibly unfitting yelp that sounded something like a kicked puppy, and the two tumbled down to the ground together until they collided with a wall, and I heard Annabeth let out a gasp of pain.

The monster quickly sprung away from her as she lay on the ground, her face twisted in grim determination, like she wanted a second round.

The Cujo wannabe shook it's head and made some more unfitting pathetic whimpers and cries, and I realized that Annabeth had cut about half of it's jaw clean off in that tackle.

It's bright red eyes locked back onto me, like somehow I had been the cause of its suffering, and pounced again. I tried to scramble back, but my hand brushed against the hilt of the sword, and I froze.

I was _not_ going to let this thing jump me twice and get away with it. I gripped the sword with my right hand and held up my left arm, placing it directly in front of the mouth of the beast, before swinging for my arm with all the might I could muster.

The monster's mangled maw caught on my forearm and it sunk its teeth through through the layers of clothing I had been wearing like it was nothing, sinking into my skin, setting my arm alight with agony. I grit my teeth and willed my right hand to keep swinging and not freeze up from the pain or drop the sword. Barely a half second later, it passed through my arm like a ghost, but cleaved the head of the monster like a buzz saw through Styrofoam.

Instantly the pressure of the bite faded as the monster dissolved into a flurry of golden dust that rained down on me, but the damage had already been done. It had bitten down pretty hard with the good side of it's jaw, and I could feel the blood oozing from the new set of wounds on my forearm, but I was alive.

I heaved a heavy sigh of relief before dropping my injured arm down on my stomach with a wince. I let myself lie there, breathing heavily, trying to calm myself down from the monster attack.

"Shit…" I heard Annabeth breath from her position on the floor. Almost lazily, I turned my head to look in her direction, only to find her clutching at her gut.

She was injured.

Panic was quick to set back in but I bit it back, and hauled myself back up, careful of my injured arm. She looked up to me and the look on her face told me that her current situation was not a good one.

"You're hurt." I said stupidly.

"I noticed." She said, but her breathing was a little ragged sounding. I saw blood trickle out from between in fingertips at an alarming rate, the rate you call an ambulance for immediately.

There are no ambulances in the apocalypse.

"Shit," I breathed, feeling my chest tighten like my lungs were being sucked out of my body. "shit, shit, shit. Fuck, you're bleeding. You're bleeding _a lot_."

"Percy,"

"Wait here, I'll get the bandages from my cabin, just keep-"

"Percy!" She cut me off and I looked at her expression helplessly. She looked so calm right now it was almost frightening. "Bandages aren't going to help."

My stomach dropped like an anchor. No. Not again. Not here.

I shook my head frantically, panic expanding in my chest and taking the place of air. "We've got to at least try! I could-"

"Percy, just shut the fuck up!" She shouted this time, her breath becoming slightly labored in audible huffs. "I need you to go to the room we were in last night and look in the drawer of the nightstand. there's a plastic bag in there, go grab it, and don't question it. Just do it right now, and bring it back to me."

Her grey eyes were wide with desperation, sending me silent pleas to just do what she said. I glanced back at her gut. Her hands were dripping with her own blood as the pressed into the fabric of her shirt in a futile attempt to slow the bleeding.

She was going to die.

"Percy," She repeated her eyes shining with intensity, "get the plastic bag."

Swallowed thickly, but rose up to my feet. I swayed slightly before running down the hall to my mom's room.

I pushed the door open and stumbled inside. The light of that green lantern still lit the room and I scrambled over to the nightstand and started fumbling with the drawer. I pulled it open and my eyes fell on the plastic baggie.

There was a lemon square inside.

I stared at it blankly for a second, before shaking my head of the confusion. No time to question it. I snatched the bag and dashed back to Annabeth.

When I got there, she had sat herself up against the wall, her hands were cupping her now horribly bloodstained shirt.

"Did you get the bag?" She huffed, her skin was starting to lose a bit of color now, which didn't serve to make me feel better at all.

I held out the little bag for her, the churning in my gut keeping the breath knocked out of me. She grimaced when she saw the bag.

"Not as big as I remembered, but It'll do…" Her eyes glanced down at her bloodied hands, as if considering, before meeting mine. "Feed it to me, I need to keep the pressure on his thing."

I took a shaky breath, but nodded, and pulled the treat out of the bag. I still had no idea what a lemon square would do to help, or how she even had one that looked so well-preserved, but I just had to hope that she wasn't requesting a last meal. I held the lemon square up to her lips, and she devoured it within just a few bites.

She licked her lips clean and took a deep breath, her eyes finding mine and offered a weak smile and a quiet sigh. "You can calm down now."

My jaw dropped open and I shook my head wordlessly at her. "I… Annabeth, you're bleeding a _lot_, you- you're…"

"I'm going to be fine." she completed, shooting me a hard look. "What you just fed me was ambrosia, the food of the gods. Inedible to the point of instant incineration for a mortal, but a half-blood will be healed by eating it, provided they're not a glutton." She pulled her hands back momentarily to peak at her wound, but winced, and pressed her hands back against her stomach not a second later.

"You don't look healed." I ground out, my tone somewhere between angry for making me worry and still profoundly concerned for her well being.

"Well, I didn't have much left." She shrugged slowly. "It's not enough to heal me completely, but I'll be fine… with time. I'm fine for now."

I scrutinized her. She still looked a shade too pale to really be considered alright. If nothing else she was suffering from the blood loss, but somehow I doubted that that's all there was to it. The very fact she was trying to tell me she was fine in any sense of the word while she was sitting in a fairly sized pool of her own blood and clutching a blood-soaked shirt for dear life was ridiculous.

Granted, it was Annabeth, but still.

"do you want some bandages for that?" I asked plainly nodding in the direction of the other cabin.

"That would be…" She inhaled deeply, and I saw her grit her teeth as she did. "appreciated, but your arm needs tending to more than me. We half-bloods are a little bit more sturdy than a mortal."

A fresh throb of pain jolted up my arm. I had almost forgotten about the bite, after all the panic of dealing with Annabeth's wound and magic lemon squares. There was blood soaking in the sweatshirt I wore under my jacket, but it didn't seem too bad from a quick glance at the holes in my jacket.

"I've got enough bandages for the both of us." I said finally.

"Oh." she said, and for the first time she seemed to be poor at hiding the relief in her expression and tone. "If you insist."

* * *

"Fuck-!" I hissed under my breath as another fresh jolt of pain scurried up my arm

Annabeth and I were sitting up against the wall of the kitchen, a few feet away from her pool of blood. I had shed the the left sides of my jacket and sweatshirt, leaving it hanging loosely by my right side, and Annabeth had her own denim jacket off and folded next to her.

"If you stopped twitching, this wouldn't be this difficult." Annabeth's tone offered no sympathy as she continued to dab at the lacerations on my arm with a wad of balled up gauze.

"I don't see why we can't just spray the bite like we did with yours wound." I grumbled to myself, but caught Annabeth rolling her eyes as she worked on cleaning my wounds.

I had already finished bandaging her wound a few minutes earlier. That had been awkward, since she had to basically strip down to her bra so the two of us could bandage it together, with her handling the front side and me handling her back. It took way longer than it should have, no thanks to how she continued to argue that my arm needed more immediate attention than her wound, and the fact she insisted I didn't look at the wound. She was surprisingly alert in spite of it all, but her breathing was still a bit labored, which made me certain that the bandages were being put to good use.

"I'm a half-blood, I'm not at huge risk of infection, period." She said as she cleaned the area around one of the smaller lacerations. "Not to mention my wound is caused by a claw and not the mouth of a monster who has been known for devouring corpses when sufficiently hungry. Now stop complaining, you're lucky you don't have a stump." She paused to inspect her work and grabbed the uncapped bottle of disinfectant, re-applying it to the now deep pink wad of gauze in her hand. I grit my teeth in preparation for what I knew she was about to do.

Her eyes found mine, and I could do little to no gulp over the swirling intensity that reminded me of gathering storm clouds. She shook her head, and moved back to my arm.

"I'm strategy of dealing with monsters is going to cost you a limb someday. Or worse if you try another stupid stunt like gambling on surviving impalement." She punctuated her words by pressing the bundle of gauze into the laceration she just cleaned out, sending fresh jolts of pain up my arm again.

I grit out a small grunt of pain. "Yeah, well, I killed the monster, didn't I?"

She frowned, but continued to inspect my arm. "Only because I cut half it's jaw off. If it had it's whole mouth intact, I'd be cauterizing your stump right now. You can't expect these suicidal plans to work every time." She nodded to herself, before grabbing a fresh roll of gauze, and began to wrap it around my arm.

"Sit still," she mumbled distractedly.

I grumbled out an unintelligible, but definitely unhappy response and looked away from her as she wrapped my arm.

In retrospect, I had gotten off pretty easy. With part of it's jaw missing, and the fact I had a few layers on, the bite marks weren't that bad. It was pretty painful to move my arm around, but provided the antiseptic did it's job, It shouldn't prove to be an issue. Hopefully.

Lazily, my eyes scanned the cabin while my foot tapped an uneven beat to try to distract myself from the pain. The shattered remains of the chair were strewn about the kitchen along with a sprinkling of broken glass, all courtesy of Lassie. The curtains on the broken window swayed lazily as the chilly sea breeze gradually filled the cabin, though it was still warmer than when the monster had suddenly appeared in the living room, that cold had a sharp, unnatural tinge to it that made it feel like it seeped into your skin and froze your bones. The natural chill of November was more like a little dog that nipped at your skin.

It was then that my eyes caught sight of something weird lying among the splintered remains of chair that didn't look much like a chair at all.

I leaned closer to get a better look, and was met with a sharp throb of pain from something brushed coarsely against my injuries. I winced, and Annabeth punched my shoulder.

"Ow!"I turned back to her. "The fuck?!"

She glared at me. "What part of sit still do you not understand?"

"So you decided to punch me?"

"Would you listen to me if I didn't punch you?"

"Yes!" I threw up my free hand in exasperation. "I would also have a less injured arm. Everyone would be winning in that situation."

She laughed, quick and disbelieving. "I don't think that's even remotely the case, you're an _awful _patient."

"Yeah, well, _you're_ an awful nurse. You could be sued with malpractice with bedside manner this shitty."

"Poor bedside manner is not illegal and can't be used to cite malpractice in any state. Now would you hold still so I can finish this?"

I grunted, but leaned back against the wall and let her tend to my arm, but kept my eyes on the bizarre-looking object. I folded my free arm against my chest like I was trying to cross my arms. After a few seconds of silently staring at the strange… thing on the ground, I realized I was getting nowhere.

"There's something on the floor." I sighed.

"That would be a combination of monster residue, chair, and glass shards." I rolled my eyes at her tone. I didn't need to be looking at her to tell she didn't take her eyes off my arm.

"I meant other than that." I felt the bandages stop wrapping around my arm.

"Oh, that." She continued wrapping my arm, nonplussed. "It's just the spoils. Sometimes when you kill a monster, it leaves something behind that doesn't turn to dust. By the looks of it, it's probably the jawbone. Teeth and horns are pretty common spoils, but since I cut off half of it's mouth, it must of just left the whole jaw."

"Oh." I said quietly, and something that felt similar to a lump of coal nested in my throat at the memory.

I glanced over at her, her eyes still trained on my arm, wrapping it slowly, like she had to get it perfect on the first try, or something. My eyes drifted down to her midsection, where she had been injured. Drying blotches of blood stained the shirt she was wearing. Considering how much blood was on the floor compared to what was on her shirt, I wasn't even entirely sure how she was conscious, much less functioning.

'_I cut off half of it's mouth._' Her words echoed against the back of my head.

"Sorry." I breathed, desperate to fill the silence.

Annabeth looked at me like I had become a snake woman out of the corner of her eye. It must not have been all that interesting, because she brought her focus back to my arm a moment later.

"About what?"

"You- I-" I stammered, realizing that I hadn't actually put any thought into an apology before my mouth moved on it's own. "I panicked when the monster lunged at me, and you had to save me."

"Oh. That." Her shoulders slumped, like a weight had been lifted off her back. "It's fine. Raise your arm a bit."

"That's it?" I stared blankly at her for a few seconds. I had expected her to be angry at me for screwing up, or at least yell at me a little. I had almost gotten her killed and it was 'fine'?

Her eyes flicked back to mine. Her expression was annoyed at best, which wasn't the expression you'd expect from someone who you almost killed, albeit indirectly.

"Yes, now raise your arm, I need better leverage to wrap this right."

I managed to lift my arm up a little higher with a small wince of pain, and she went back to work. It took me a while of staring blankly at her before I could figure out how to respond to her whole attitude towards me screwing up with nearly fatal consequences.

"You could have died."

"Could have, didn't." She replied, nonplussed. "Lower your arm again."

I grit my teeth. I couldn't even understand why, but I was starting to get mad because she _wasn't_ mad at me, which is stupid and ridiculous, but this was easily the second worst fuckup of my life. It was almost patronizing.

"Annabeth, I'm serious!" I snapped.

Finally, she turned to face me, studying me until whatever invisible thing gave her whatever answer she was looking for.

"And so am I," She said coolly. "I just told you that it's not an issue. You've never held a sword before in your life, and you've only ever fought two monsters, so I wasn't expecting you to be my pinch hitter. I've been training to fight these monster for over eight years, and I've actually been fighting them for even longer. Getting hurt was…" She paused like something sour had been placed in her mouth. "An error on my part. I misjudged it's lunge and my knife came up short of it's skull and the kill."

"But I-" I stammered and stumbled on my words. Annabeth was, as usual, making an infuriating amount of sense, but I still couldn't help but feel responsible.

"Percy, even I was startled by it shadow-traveling in here. I've never seen one of those monsters use that so aggressively before. It's almost like..." Her eyes went a little distant, but she quickly found focus again. "Never mind, it was probably just hungry or desperate. It was kind of small."

The thought of running into a larger version of that monster was as unbelievable as it was terrifying, but I shook my head, and stared down at the pool of blood at our feet. It just felt like empty words to me. Even if she wasn't angry with me, it was still all my fault in the first place.

"I don't blame you for being scared, you know." She said slowly, like she was testing her ground. I ignored that.

"I wasn't-!" I opened my mouth to argue as I jerked back up to get in her face, but the words died in my throat when I saw her expression. She was studying me again, but for the first time it didn't feel like she was just looking for reactions and tells. Apparently, she took my silence as a sign to continue.

"Everyone who isn't a total idiot gets scared by their first encounters with monsters." She said with a slight shake of her head, as if to dismiss any arguments I could make before I made them. "Don't beat yourself up over it, and don't feel guilty about me getting hurt, either, because I don't regret helping you the first time, and I don't regret helping you now."

I opened my mouth to speak only to find I really didn't have any words. Instead I just stared at her like a weirdo for a little bit too long.

Her face suddenly scrunched up and the moment died.

"Now would you lower your arm already? I'm not done." She said, exasperated.

Heat blossomed on my cheeks and I realized that my arm was, in fact, still throbbing, and abruptly dropped it down into her lap, sending sharp jolts of pain running up my arm all over again. She gave me an unimpressed look and I sheepishly raised my arm again, looking away so she could finish her work without dying of embarrassment first.

After a few seconds of silence, I muttered a very quiet 'thanks'.

I felt her pause, but she continued her work without another word.

Almost a full minute later, I heard a small tearing noise and a small click of satisfaction.

"Done." Annabeth announced. Cautiously,I pulled my arm back, and cradled it against my chest, like you do when it's broken. I looked down at the neat wrappings and grimaced. They were pretty much perfect-looking, which was about as annoying as it was unsurprising.

I pulled the left side of my jacket and sweatshirt back up and slung them on my shoulder. I had no interest in trying to get my arm through them both at this point, not after how painful getting them off was.

Annabeth wrapped up the remaining gauze neatly, her lips pursed like she was disappointed in the roll of gauze in her hands.

"You only have one and a half rolls of gauze left," She sighed, putting the roll back into the box. "We'll have to rotate the positioning of our bandages instead of replacing them, or you'll run out. I should have used less on my leg."

"They were made to be used," I said with a shrug. "it's no big deal."

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me, but gave me a terse nod after a moment. The two of us lapsed into a silence that I could tell was going to quickly turn awkward.

"Does it hurt?" I asked.

"The wound? Not really."

"Not really isn't no." I raised an eyebrow. "Are you able to like… walk around and stuff?"

I noticed her shift uncomfortably where she was sitting, and a hand ghosted over her stomach. Somehow, I doubted she was feeling as good as she was managing to present herself, which sent a fresh wave of guilt through me. Annabeth might think it's alright, but that didn't mean I had to agree with her, no matter how thankful I was.

"I'm fine." She insisted with an edge to her tone.

"I'm pretty sure you need to take it easy." I said with a frown.

"Percy…" She said in a warning tone, her eyes narrowing dangerously.

"Annabeth, seriously," I sighed.

"Just drop it," She growled, "I said I would be fine."

"That doesn't mean you _need_ to try to push yourself." I groaned, running my good hand down my face. When I looked back at Annabeth, her arms were crossed. It felt like we were waltzing straight back into arguments again, which I didn't want, and we didn't need.

"Look," I said, " I know you're not interested in being my partner or whatever, but this is different. I'm not half as hurt as you are, and you're probably a lot better off with someone around to help you out. It's my fault you're hurt in the first place."

"I don't need someone to take care of me." She snapped.

"I know! You're better at this than I am, but you're hurt, and I can help make things easier for you until you get better." I paused, and quickly amended, " If you want. I won't even bother you about your family stuff."

She pursed her lips thoughtfully, but she seemed hesitant. Eventually she shook her head.

"I don't want to force you."

"I want to." I insisted, "After all you've done for me, helping you out a little while you take some time to heal is the least I could do."

She stared at me for a long time, scrutinizing me, and eventually she smirked.

"I think I'm starting to get that determined thing now," She chuckled softly to herself, and shook her head, when she looked back at me, her expression hardened. "There are gonna be ground rules."

I rolled my eyes. "I'm not surprised."

"But first," Her nose wrinkled like she had taken a whiff of something putrid. "let's get off the floor. You're definitely not going to be carrying me now that your arm is a certified chew toy, and it's fucking freezing."

"Good plan."

She held her hands up in mock surrender.

"It's what I do."

* * *

_**AN: Criminally late yet again. Finals week mang. More like finals three weeks of endless papers. On top of that this chapter was being... fussy to say the least. The hellhound scene was originally languid, I needed to trim the fat a shitload and I scrapped a huge portion of it. **_

_**The good news is that with me out of school, I have more time to write, and ergo, I can actually follow my schedule! Even more good news is that, provided everything goes well, The plot can finally get off the ground starting next chapter. Yes, I have subjected you to 37000 words of scene setting, bite me.**_

_**On top of that, I am still looking or a Beta! Message me if you're interested.**_


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